KUALA LUMPUR, Jan. 21 -- While Malaysia awaits the tabling of a federal Freedom of Information (FOI) Act, the states of Selangor and Penang remain the only two territories in the country where citizens possess a statutory "right to know".

A Cabinet meeting on October 17 last year decided that the FOI Bill could not be tabled in the December 2025 parliamentary sitting due to a full agenda, and deferred it to early this year.

Enacted purportedly to promote transparency and accountability, the idea for these state-level laws was to allow the public to request documents held by government departments.

However, navigating the bureaucracy requires a clear understanding of the rules. Here is how the FOI laws in these two states function.

How...