The Constitution in Sections 195 (1)(f) and (g) mentions that governance should be accountable and transparent. The National Archives Act of South Africa stipulates that accountability and transparency can only happen if:

• The public, to which governmental bodies are accountable, has ready access to all information that underpins the decision-making processes of governmental bodies
• The Office of the Auditor General has ready access to information on the financial transactions entered into by governmental bodies to enable it to report to the public on the spending of their tax

The state has taken this mandate further with the recent introduction of POPIA which is designed to safeguard the process of   secure storage and distribution of personal information. There are a number of other pieces of legislation that drive home the need for a codified approach to records and metadata definition as well as appropriate classification schema’s and aligned Identity and access management.