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When the Administration takes a decision which confirms an initial decision, the time limit to contest the decision starts to run from the date of the initial decision. In the case at hand, while the Applicant was notified of the contested decision on 2 November 2009, he only requested management evaluation of this decision on 31 March 2010. He thus failed to comply with the established time limit to request management evaluation. When a staff member wishes to contest a decision which, in his view, is unlawful because of the incompetence of the body which took the decision, he/she should...

The Tribunal cannot review the Alleged Harassment complaint as management evaluation is a prerequisite to an application before the Tribunal—see Planas 2010-UNAT-049 and Syed 2010-UNAT-061. The Tribunal does not have the power to suspend or waive time limits—see Costa 2010-UNAT-036. In this case there was no request for, or grant of an extension by the Secretary General. Therefore, regardless of whether there were attempts at informal resolution (or, indeed any other circumstance or factor), the Applicant’s challenge to the First Decision is out of time as it was filed more than 60 days after...

Receivability: Decisions by the Ethics Office are administrative decisions that are subject to appeal before the Tribunal, since they may directly affect staff members’ rights. A request for management evaluation has to be sought prior to the filing of the application and hence her request to regularize her application a posteriori could only be rejected, in accordance with staff rule 11.2, namely the required antecedence of the request for management evaluation to the application.

The Tribunal found that the Applicant first became aware that something was amiss in the recruitment process on 29 February 2008 when he was told that a “hold had been put on” the issuance of his letter of appointment by the SRSG. Subsequently, the Applicant was aware of the decision to appoint another candidate to the position in question in June 2008. Still later, in April 2009, and from the Applicant’s own; submissions, while in New York, he received what he called a “verbal apology” (for the way things turned out) from the Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations. The...

The Respondent contends that the application is not receivable because the Applicant did not exhaust the administrative process of seeking reconsideration of her claim pursuant to art. 17 of Appendix D to the Staff Rules. The Tribunal found that the application was receivable as the Respondent’s contention is not supported by a proper interpretation of art. 17.

The UNDT found no grounds for excusing the Applicant from his obligation to first request management evaluation before filing his application with the Dispute Tribunal.

The UNDT found that the application was not receivable as the Applicant had failed to take the mandatory first step of requesting management evaluation of the contested decision. However, it observed that while failure to request management evaluation denies the Applicant access to the Tribunal’s jurisdiction at present, the Applicant was never formally notified in writing of the administrative decision or the reasons therefore. Furthermore, the Tribunal noted that the situation in this case arose through an alleged mistake of the Administration and through no fault of the Applicant.

The UNDT found that the Applicant contested the administrative decision after the 60 day deadline for requesting a management evaluation had passed. Her Application was therefore not receivable as the Tribunal is not competent to extend the deadline for a request for management evaluation.

As consistently held by UNAT, the Dispute Tribunal has no jurisdiction to waive deadlines for management evaluation or administrative review. Time limits prescribed for administrative review (and management evaluation under the new system), which could be waived under the previous system, cannot be waived under article 8.3 of the Statute of the Dispute Tribunal, due to a specific prohibition in this respect contained in article 8.3.

Requests for management evaluation are mandatory first steps in the appeal process.Outcome: Application rejected on receivability