A Circuit Court judge has ordered the Native Hawaiian Roll Commission to make public the list of those who have registered to participate in the nation-building campaign funded by the Office of Hawaiian Affairs.

The conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch, which filed the lawsuit with help from the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii, hailed the ruling as a victory for open government.

“The court pointed out that Hawaii’s open records law was intended to ensure that the formation and conduct of public policy be conducted as openly as possible,” former Hawaii Attorney General Michael A. Lilly, who represented Judicial Watch in the case, said in a statement.

Judge Jeannette Castag-netti on Wednesday ordered the release of the list on a schedule to be approved in the next few days and directed the commission to pay attorneys’ fees in the case.

Former Gov. John Waihee, the roll commission’s chairman, said Thursday that the group will comply with the judge’s order, but it won’t be the certified list that was originally requested. That’s because registrations are still being taken, eligibility is still being checked and the list has not been certified.

“I really think it’s a whole to-do about nothing,” he said.

People already can check their status on the list by visiting kanaiolowalu.org or hawaiianroll.org, he said.

In addition, a preliminary paper list of registrants was made available for review by the public in late March and early April of last year at public libraries and OHA offices around the state, Waihee said.

The Hawaiian Roll Commission was created in 2011 after passage of a state law recognizing Native Hawaiians as the only indigenous people of the islands. The commission was charged with preparing and maintaining a roll of qualified Native Hawaiians who would be eligible to vote in a self-determination process.

The Kanaiolowalu registry campaign was launched in July 2012.

On Thursday the Kanaiolowalu website showed that 122,785 people are registered. Of that number, some 40,000 are new registrants, while the rest were added from previous registries, including Kau Inoa, Operation Ohana and the Hawaiian Registry.

People on earlier registries had to contact the commission if they did not want their names transferred. But few have exercised that option, commission officials said.

Grassroot Institute President Keli‘i Akina said there are serious questions about the tens of thousands of names that were placed on the list without the express permission of individuals.

“The fact stands that the vast majority of Hawaiians have chosen not to support the efforts of OHA and the Native Hawaiian Roll to create a sovereign government. Their voices can now be heard,” Akina said in a statement.

Judicial Watch said the suit was filed after an open-records request for the roll was repeatedly denied last summer by the commission. Judicial Watch had argued that citizens were entitled to see the records, especially if their names happened to be on the lists without their knowledge.

Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton called the nation-building campaign a scheme to divide Hawaii by race.

“Racial classifications designed to allocate political power and government benefits are bad; attempting to unlawfully use Hawaiian citizens’ names, without their consent, to create those classifications is even worse,” Fitton said in a news release.

Akina added, “Hopefully OHA will stop wasting public money on its unconstitutional push for sovereignty and, instead, spend it on housing, education, employment, and health services for those in need.”

OHA recently handed off responsibility for the final stage of the nation-building campaign to a new group that will independently administer an election of delegates, convention and final ratification vote.

Na‘i Aupuni, a group of five volunteer and unpaid directors with ties to Hawaiian royalty, has been given nearly $2.6 million originally earmarked for the effort to oversee the self-determination process. The group is expected to complete the nation-building campaign by early 2016, although a final time frame has not been set.

Waihee said the Native Hawaiian Roll Commission plans to keep registration open for as long as possible.