“Section 6 (1) of the enabling law requires the Ombudsman to prepare a report and submit it to the Speaker of the National Assembly who shall present it to the National Assembly. It further mandates the Ombudsman to prepare and submit an annual report on the Ombudsman’s activities on its investigations to the Speaker of the National Assembly. However, the Ombudsman could not ascertain whether its annual reports has been considered or discussed in Parliament.

The Ombudsman indicated that Parliamentary rules require parliamentarians to consider and discuss all reports tabled before them. The Ombudsman reports that it engages with the standing committee on constitutional and legal affairs directly to draw their attention to important issues in the annual reports.

The SCA considers it important that the enabling laws of an NHRI establish a process whereby the Institution’s reports are widely circulated, discussed and considered by the legislature. It would be preferable if the NHRI has an explicit power to table reports directly in the legislature, and in so doing to promote action on them.

The SCA encourages the Ombudsman to advocate for changes to its enabling law to explicitly indicate the procedure by which their reports will be discussed and considered.

The SCA refers to its General Observation 1.11 on ‘Annual reports of NHRIs’.”