Judgment No. 4811
Decision
The complaint is dismissed.
Summary
The complainant, widow and successor of a former consultant for the FAO, who died while on official travel on the Organization’s behalf, impugns the Director-General’s decision dismissing her internal appeal against the decision informing her that the incident leading to her husband’s death had not been recognised as attributable to the performance of official duties and that she therefore was not entitled to claim compensation.
Judgment keywords
Keywords
summary procedure; complaint dismissed
Consideration 7
Extract:
The Tribunal entirely agrees with the findings and recommendation of the Appeals Committee, which the Director-General followed in the impugned decision, and recalls that time limits are an objective matter of fact and strict adherence to them is necessary to ensure the stability of the parties’ legal relations (see, for example, Judgments 4673, consideration 13, 4374, consideration 8, 4184, consideration 4, and the case law cited therein).
According to the Tribunal’s firm precedent based on the provisions of Article VII, paragraph 1, of its Statute, the fact that an appeal lodged by a complainant was out of time renders her or his complaint irreceivable for failure to exhaust the internal means of redress, which cannot be deemed to have been exhausted unless recourse has been had to them in compliance with the formal requirements and within the prescribed time limit (see Judgments 4655, consideration 20, 4160, consideration 13, and 4159, consideration 11, as well as, for example, Judgments 2888, consideration 9, 2326, consideration 6, and 2010, consideration 8). As the complainant’s appeal of 23 July 2021 was lodged late, the present complaint is clearly irreceivable.
Reference(s)
Jugement(s) TAOIT: 2010, 2326, 2888, 4159, 4160, 4184, 4374, 4655, 4673
Keywords
receivability of the complaint; internal appeal; failure to exhaust internal remedies; late appeal
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