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The case concerned a message related to the COVID-19 pandemic that was posted on the European Commission’s intranet forum, which is reserved for Commission staff members. The complainant, a Commission staff member, had reported the message as hate speech and wanted the Commission to remove it. The Commission refused and the complainant turned to the Ombudsman.

The Ombudsman found that the Commission’s decision not to remove the message was reasonable because it did not consider the message to be hate speech or contrary to its moderation policy. The Ombudsman closed the inquiry with the conclusion that there was no maladministration in this case.

The complainant sought public access to documents related to a procurement procedure organised by the European Commission.

The Commission granted access to parts of the documents only. It argued that fully disclosing the requested documents would undermine the privacy and the integrity of the persons mentioned, the tenderers’ commercial interests and the Commission’s internal decision-making.

The Ombudsman inquiry team inspected the documents in question and found that the tender bids contained detailed information about the winning tenderer’s strategies and methodologies and the key experts proposed by that tenderer. The other documents contained the Commission’s evaluation of the bids. All documents contained some personal data.

In light of this, the Ombudsman considered that the Commission’s refusal to grant public access to the documents was reasonable and in line with the EU legislation on public access to documents. 

The Ombudsman thus closed the inquiry finding no maladministration.

The complainant worked as an expert for an external contractor to the EU Delegation to Ghana. Not having been paid for her work, the complainant turned to the Ombudsman, claiming that the EU Delegation had failed to ensure that the external contractor respects its obligations towards the experts.

The Ombudsman found that both the EU Delegation and the European Commission had acted in accordance with the applicable rules when withholding some payments under the contract. She also found that they had taken appropriate action vis-a-vis the contractor to try to resolve the situation that affected the complainant. The Ombudsman considers that the Commission has adequate mechanisms in place to monitor contractors, and she trusts the Commission will use these mechanisms to monitor the situation and to take action within its remit if needed.

The Ombudsman therefore closed the case with a finding of no maladministration.