The President of the Republic, Mr. Wavel Ramkalawan formally received the Annual Report of the Ombudsman for the year ending 31st December 2022 presented personally by the Ombudsman, Mrs. Nichole Tirant-Ghérardi.
The report presented at State House this morning, covers the activities of the Office of the Ombudsman in the year 2022. This is in line with Paragraph 6 (6) of the Schedule 5 of the Constitution, which requires the Office to make a general Annual Report on the exercise of the Ombudsman’s functions during the previous year.
During the meeting the Ombudsman briefed the Head of State on how her office has operated last year, the challenges encountered such as staffing, sensitizing the public of the mandate of the Office of the Ombudsman and what it does, and how the Government can help facilitate the work of her office.
The President conveyed his sincere appreciation to Mrs. Tirant-Ghérardi for her hard work and commitment and reaffirmed the government’s continuous support in the important work that her office does.
Speaking to the press after the meeting, Mrs. Tirant-Ghérardi said that 173 complaints were lodged with her office last year, whereby 30 cases were further looked at by her office. She explained that the others, out of which were complaints of employment, immigration, and medical cases were outside of the remit or mandate of the Office of the Ombudsman.