Your Right to Ask: How Freedom of Information Works in the US, UK and Nigeria
Three countries, three laws, one principle: public institutions answer to you. Here is exactly how to file a request in each — and what to do when they stall.
Every democracy in this guide has written the same promise into law: if a public body holds information, you can ask for it, and silence is not an acceptable answer. The United States passed FOIA in 1966, the United Kingdom followed with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, and Nigeria signed its FOI Act in 2011. The mechanics differ; the principle does not.
What you can ask for
Budgets, contracts, inspection reports, correspondence, meeting minutes, datasets. If a ministry, agency, council or public university produced it or holds it, it is presumptively yours. Each law carves out exemptions — national security, personal data, ongoing investigations — but the burden sits with the institution to justify withholding, not with you to justify asking.
The clock starts when you ask
United States: agencies have 20 working days to respond under FOIA. Requests are free for the first hours of search time; many agencies accept email or web portals.
United Kingdom: 20 working days under the FOI Act 2000. Any written request counts — you do not need to cite the Act, though it helps.
Nigeria: 7 days under the FOI Act 2011, the tightest deadline of the three, extendable once by another 7.
The first time an agency answers you on deadline, something shifts. You stop being an audience and start being a participant.
— Funmi Adebayo, Right to Know Nigeria
When they stall
Non-response is the most common failure mode in all three countries. Each law gives you an appeal route: administrative appeal then federal court in the US, the Information Commissioner’s Office in the UK, and direct application to a court in Nigeria. On Nject, you can log your request publicly and ring the bell when the deadline passes — institutions respond faster when the clock is visible.