By Andrea Sophocleous
SERIOUS operational weaknesses in many government departments and the violation of the basic human rights of a large number of citizens were the core problems identified by Ombudsman Nicos Charalambous in his 1997 report.
In his seventh annual report, released yesterday, Charalambous named a number of civil service departments that had not responded to his recommendations. The primary culprits were the Health, Immigration and Lands and Survey departments.
He said 14 per cent of complaints against government services, made by members of the public to the ombudsman’s office, were not acted upon due to serious functional weaknesses on the part of the government services concerned.
The Ombudsman underlined that he would confront this problem through the use of special reports, which are presented to the cabinet and have equal status as a legal decision. He noted that each time he submitted a special report to the government, action was taken.
“I will in future be making greater use of this right,” he warned.
Speaking at a press conference where he presented his report’s findings, Charalambous stressed the need to attribute more importance to the Ombudsman’s office and appealed for more active support from the House Watchdog committees as well as to the media to give more coverage to his reports.
The Ombudsman’s office dealt with a record of 1,225 complaints about the civil service last year, a 32.5 per cent increase on the previous year.
Charalambous said there was evidence of anachronistic perceptions on the part of some government services, as concerned the relationship between the state and its citizens, something he believes can be improved with the introduction of a Citizen’s Charter.
A Citizen’s Charter would set out behaviour and service guidelines, transparency mechanisms, means for information sharing, and investigative procedures. The guidelines would establish a code of behaviour to be followed by the civil services.
Another suggestion made by the Ombudsman was the setting up of internal checking systems to deal with complaints within each government department.
“The need for the introduction of such a system is considered of particular importance in the case of semi-governmental organisations,” Charalambous argued.
Being World Environment Day yesterday, the Ombudsman also referred to a number of environmental problems which he had reported several times in the past, but on which the government had failed to act. He pointed to Limassol’s old port and the Ayia Marina garbage dump as areas of particular concern and noted that there was “a lack of minimal respect for the environment.”
As in previous years, Charalambous remarked that his office was inadequately staffed and faced difficulty in dealing with the increased number of complaints.
Since the creation of the Ombudsman’s office in 1993, complaints have risen from 378 in the first year to 1,225 in 1997.
