Bonum Certa Men Certa

Correspondence With Dražen Petrović Reveals That ILO-AT is Indeed an Employer's Court, Favouring EPO Management Over EPO Staff

Not a labourers' court but a labourers' foe, which drains their money under the assumption that fair trials are possible and employers would comply with an unfavourable outcome (some don't, without facing any consequences)

Cicero's Use of Judicial Theater
Reference: Cicero's Use of Judicial Theater



Summary: What's publicly advertised as access to justice for aggrieved employees in international institutions seems to boil down to injustice perpetuated and rubber-stamped, or unfavourable rulings (against employers) not being followed

THE face-saving tactic/strategy of the EPO, namely hiding behind the face of António Campinos, doesn't impress us because we more or less understand what goes on behind the scenes. 12 days ago, for example, we showed the EPO's management fighting to just 'intercept' or underline/thwart (for lack of a better word) the ILO cases. Justice isn't the goal; they just waste stakeholders' money on lawyers, trying to 'win' cases at all costs, draining complainants' savings using legal bills. This is pure evil. This is known as legal bullying and staff should go public with this kind of stuff. It appears to be part of a pattern and a trend, which we assume SUEPO is well aware of already.



We've managed to obtain recent correspondence which sheds light on human rights aspects of all this, starting with the following from ILO-AT:

Dear ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆

Complaint No. ⬆⬆⬆⬆

Further to my email of 12 July 2018 concerning your 13th complaint please be advised that the President of the Tribunal has approved your request to reply to the EPO’s comments.

I therefore ask you to send me six copies of your reply to the EPO’s comments by Monday, 20 August 2018.

The procedural requests mentioned in your emails of 12 and 16 July 2018 have no legal basis.

Yours sincerely,

Dražen Petrović Greffier/Registrar 4, route des Morillons 1211 Genève 22 Suisse


Here's the response:

Dear Sir or Madam,

With regard to your e-mail here below I respectfully request to extend my term for reply to 120 days from now and to stay the proceedings in my ⬆⬆ case no. ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆ during the procedural term for reply in case no. ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆

Reasons:

1. My chronic illness, see letter by OH physician,

2. Recent pain in my right wrist under examination/treatment (since my last procedural term, see recent e-mail by my GP which I feel unable to translate currently*

3. Frequent stomach pain due to severe nervous stress caused by the EPO's procedural conduct, slight gastritis recently diagnosed, see recent gastroenterologist's report*

4. The EPO's two(!) professional(!) lawyers had 90 days for their reply. In view of the principle of equal treatment of the parties I should normally be granted a term double as long as that granted to them, as I am just one(!) former employee, not a professional lawyer and also ill.

Please confirm receipt for this e-mail.

Sincerely yours,

⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆


The ILO-AT set another 30-days term for reply after the EPO had a term of 90 days for their last submissions. This isn't the first time they do this to this complainant and they probably do the same thing to other complainants.

Extension requested by the complainant resulted in this:

Dear ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆

Complaints Nos ⬆⬆⬆⬆ and ⬆⬆⬆⬆

I acknowledge receipt of your email of 20 July 2018.

I shall consult the President of the Tribunal on your request to extend the time limit for sending me your reply to the EPO’s comments to your further submissions on your ⬆⬆⬆⬆ complaint (AT ⬆⬆⬆⬆).

If the President grants the above request for extension, we shall then seek the views of the EPO’s counsel on your application to stay the proceedings on your ⬆⬆⬆⬆ complaint (AT ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆) for the duration of that extension. The President will decide on that application inlight of the views of both parties.

Yours sincerely,

Dražen Petrović Greffier/Registrar 4, route des Morillons 1211 Genève 22 Suisse


This is the latest:

Complaints no. ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆ and ⬆⬆⬆⬆

Dear Sir or Madam,

With regard to your e-mail of 24 July 2018: The procedure indicated by you here below is much too slow, given that you set me a term of 30 days only, until 20 August 2018, for my reply in re AT ⬆⬆⬆⬆. This way I cannot make use of my rights under Article 5.1 of the Tribunal's Rules to plead my own case. On ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆ 2017 you swiftly extended my term of reply the following day. In view of my chronic illness with proven recent aggravation (see attachments of this year to my e-mail of ⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆) I respectfully request a prompt extension of my term of reply also now.

In view of the Tribunal's generally presumed independence it is not to the EPO to determine or even influence the Tribunal's procedural decisions in my cases.

Sincerely yours,

⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆⬆


There seems to be some 'circulation' for this case, as it's one of many that became more famous (or notorious). Quite a few people became familiar with this case, so ILO-AT can no longer keep it secret/confidential. In the above, the compliant is being implicitly refused an extension once more. This happened repeatedly at an earlier stage in various cases. Thereby staff rights under Article 6 ECHR as well as under Article 5.1 of the Tribunal's Rules were violated.

"What good is a ruling without actual enforcement of it? Is an ILO-AT decision legally-binding only when employers win and mere judicial theatre when employees win a case?"No matter what they do, EPO complainants are being thrown around, compelled to spend a lot of time and money on cases that would likely go nowhere because, as SUEPO puts is, ILO-AT is an "employer's court". SUEPO and some SUEPO members are obviously keeping abreast of all this; in fact, that's how the information gets leaked to us. It is being passed around and unless ILO (Guy Ryder, Dražen Petrović and the rest of them) care about their reputation, things will only exacerbate over time. This is, inadvertedly, becoming a case of ILO scandals, not just EPO scandals. Many nowadays feel as though ILO merely protects EPO management. It isn't even enforcing rulings against EPO management, e.g. Judge Corcoran, SUEPO leaders and so on. What good is a ruling without actual enforcement of it? Is an ILO-AT decision legally-binding only when employers win and mere judicial theatre when employees win a case? This sort of judicial deficit can't really be reported to anyone because ILO (UN) is itself immune, hence in a certain sense beyond and above the law.

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