Articles of law: Obscured, forgotten

A PROBLEM that has long struck me and for which I do not have an answer is that I often come across articles of law in various systems that include binding provisions or stipulate the rights of certain parties. Yet these provisions are not applicable. On the contrary, they are stashed away and forgotten. If a client ever asks for an article to be applied, he faces rejection by the relevant authority, the official, or the judge without any justification whatsoever.

In other cases, there are articles that stipulate plainly, precisely, and decisively for the prohibition of certain practices, yet surprisingly, you find that these practices are so prevalent you would think they were mandatory, and the person who refers to its prohibition thus becomes the object of sarcasm and irony.

The utmost respect for all regulations and a strong binding to apply them should be the case all around. Any violations for these should be subject to severe penalties as a deterrent for those who do not comply with them. Once this has been done, these regulations will become honored and rights will become protected.

Though the penalty for some of these banned acts is severe, the person who commits them often receives praise. Obvious examples of such acts are bribery, personal recommendations and intermediation. If an official breaches the terms of his employment, he should receive the utmost penalty for bribery.

The question is: To what extent is illegal intermediation prevalent in governmental departments? Is the person practicing being lamented? How many rights are lost as a result of the less competent person getting the job and the other losing his lawful right in getting it?

Is there a supervisory agency to follow-up these cases? To make the persons concerned accountable?

If the door was opened to receive grievances, we would have a pile of them. More seriously, when these articles are included in a set of regulations relating to rights and freedoms, or judicial proceedings that are essential in the court of law, and judgments and integrity are dependent on them, all this requires the parties tasked with their implementation to be exemplary in respecting the rule of law.

The most noticeable task for the regulator (the administrative court) what so-called cancellation actions that is when a government department abstain from carrying out its duty. This represents the most obvious example for an official refraining to comply with regulations.

The problem is that not anyone is capable of filing a lawsuit, nor it is a norm for people to do so. There should be strong and clear respect with binding implementation for all regulations. Provisions must be set to criminalize violations with penalties acting as a deterrent. Otherwise, there is no need or value to whatever regulations or laws exist.

This also applies to royal decrees and decisions made by the Cabinet of Ministers. There are a bulk of royal decrees and decisions that have found their way to the shelves, some of them very important, so the problems still exist and the answers remain out of reach.

We are in desperate need of a national project to follow up these regulations and articles of law, to inspect their state of affairs and to assess whether or not they are valid. Some of these need to be activated and applied and should no longer remain in the drawer.

Though this is the task of the Control and Investigation Board, it is nonetheless a very difficult job with its current limitations.

The door should be kept open for any person facing rejection to apply the law from an official, to file a complaint to a supervisory agency, which acts in its turn to force order, and make the official accountable for his actions.

May God show us the right way, and establish truth and justice in our system.