Turkey's chief ombudsman angles for 'prosecuting authority' from Parliament
by Daily Sabah
ANKARAMar 09, 2016 - 12:00 am GMT+3
by Daily Sabah
Mar 09, 2016 12:00 am
Ombudsman Institution (KDK) President Nihat Ömeroğlu spoke at Parliament's Petition-Human Rights Joint Commission on Monday and provided details on the KDK's activities during 2015.
With efforts to achieve more accurate results from the accepted inspection applications dating back three-and-a-half years, Ömeroğlu requested Parliament to grant him the authority of litigation and the authority to conduct official investigations into authorities that do not meet the recommended decision of KDK. Ömeroğlu said that the KDK wants to have "prosecuting authority" from Parliament to have "healthier" results from previously accepted applications.
Ömeroğlu said that 6,055 applications were made in 2015 and nearly 60 percent of them were submitted through the e-application system. He also said that about 37 percent of the applications were rejected because they were summited without considering the administrative details and about 29 percent were considered unobservable. He said that he would like to strengthen the powers of the ombudsman and he informed the committee members about a draft bill regarding the issue. Ömeroğlu outlined the requirements that need to be granted to bestow the desired authority: "There needs to be a mechanism that would allow litigation against institutions that do obey the laws and disregard the recommended decision of the KDK." He explained that the mechanism should also fulfill the decisions made by the Parliament speaker's office and/or by Parliament's joint committee of the institution.
"The ombudsman institutions of Portugal and Spain are authorized to cancel the case law of the Constitutional Court. European ombudsman institutions are also authorized to give an opinion on proposed laws and submit it to their parliaments," he said. Ömeroğlu further said that "if necessary, the ombudsman has the authority to submit legislative proposals to the president of the parliament. I am just trying to propose the existing mechanisms of European ombudsmen."
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