Welcome to two new Freedom of Information websites now running on the Alaveteli platform: Derecho A Preguntar (Right To Ask) in Nicaragua, and QueremoSaber (We Want To Know) in Paraguay.

Alaveteli is our software that makes it easy to set up and run an FOI website; with these two recent launches, it’s now powering 25 Freedom of Information sites all around the world.

Both countries’ constitutions enshrine their citizens’ right to information from public authorities, but, just as here in the UK, that right isn’t always widely known. So for both sites the aim is to help increase awareness of FOI among citizens.

In Nicaragua, Fundación Violeta B. de Chamorro set up their site with the aid of Hivos (and with hosting and development support from us). Paraguay’s TEDIC are the organisation behind QueremoSaber, and they’ve set it up with very little help from our side. Always good to know that can be done!

As a side note, take a glance at both sites to see how thoroughly Alaveteli can be ‘skinned’ to each organisation’s own design preferences. In fact, you only have to cast you eyes over all 25 deployments to see how each has its own very distinct character. Derecho A Preguntar actually took the foundation of its design from Spain’s TuDerechoASaber, which is one of the great benefits of the Alaveteli community: the chance to share, in this case, not just support and advice, but a design template.

We’re very glad to see these two sites up and running. Together with Alaveteli sites in Uruguay and Panama (where the government uses the platform for its official FOI provision), they’re helping bring better access to information to Latin America.