Anti-fraud office goes in pursuit of clarity

21.06.2007 / 00:00 CET

I am referring to your column (Entre Nous, 7-13 June) in which you make reference to the OLAF press release of 4 June 2007 entitled ‘Investigation concerning cleaning services'. As your article contains some incorrect or misleading information we would like to make the following clarifications for your readers:

OLAF press releases are signed by the OLAF spokesman. But contrary to what you insinuate they do not reflect his personal views but constitute an official declaration of the European Anti-Fraud Office;

Contrary to what you wrote, Alessandro Butticé, the OLAF spokesman and head of unit “Spokesman, Communication and Public Relations” never “acted as returning officer in the last round of elections for the staff unions”. In fact, he was the president of the electoral office for the 2006 elections to the European Commission's local Staff Committee Brussels, that is the statutory representation of all employees vis-à-vis their employer. His function ended with the successful conclusion of the staff elections 2006 which, for the first time, were not subject to any appeal before the courts;

Contrary to what you wrote, Mr Butticé did not “curiously” exercise this function. In fact, he was elected to this office by the General Assembly of the Commission staff in Brussels. He took over this function considering that shortcomings in the electoral procedures of previous staff elections had led to lawsuits.
You will understand that, in our endeavour to maintain transparency and clarity, we will put this letter on our website and also copy it to the API and the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) as we usually do in such cases.

Jörg Wojahn
OLAF
Brussels

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