UNDT/2018/012, Cabeia Chys
UNAT Held or UNDT Pronouncements
The Tribunal found that the contested decision in the present case was the High Commissioner’s decision of 17 October 2014, which considered the Applicant’s candidacy for promotion at the P-5 level, notified to the Applicant on 20 October 2014. This decision was not subject to any further review or superseded by a new one.; The Tribunal noted that the decision of 2 March 2015 did not consider the Applicant’s recourse application on the merits as it was filed out of time, which left the original decision of 17 October 2014 undisturbed. The Tribunal therefore found that the decision of 2 March 2015, which rejected the Applicant’s recourse application for procedural defect, did not create a new right for the Applicant to challenge the original, substantive,; decision not to promote him to the P-5 level and, therefore, did not consider it for the purpose of art. 8(1)(d)(i)(a) of the Tribunal’s Statute.; The Tribunal found that the decision on non-promotion insofar as the Applicant was concerned was notified to him on 20 October 2014 and not subject to any further review. The Applicant’s request for management evaluation, submitted on 1 May 2015, was thus time-barred. Consequently, the application before the Tribunal was irreceivable, ratione materiae (Egglesfield 2014-UNAT-402); Furthermore, the Tribunal noted that the application was also irreceivable ratione temporis as it was filed four days after the expiry of the 90-day statutory deadline set forth in art. 8(1)(d)(i)(a) of the Tribunal’s Statute. The Applicant filed his application before the Tribunal on 1 February 2016, that is four days after the applicable deadline, which expired on 28 January 2016.
Decision Contested or Judgment/Order Appealed
The Applicant, a staff member of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (“UNHCR”), contested the decision of the High Commissioner not to promote him from the P-4 to the P-5 level during the 2013 Promotions Session.
Legal Principle(s)
An application before the Dispute Tribunal is not receivable if the underlying request for management evaluation was itself time-barred.; The right to seek recourse against non-promotion decisions provided for in UNHCR’s Promotions Policy is not mandatory but optional (Khan UNDT/2016/005).