AFM promotions system draws fire from ombudsman

The ombudsman, Joe Sammut, has opened fire at the Armed Forces of Malta over promotions, saying the commander's hesitation to remedy "manifestly unjust decisions" and various shortcomings in the AFM's career advancement system "have contributed towards the general loss of confidence in the management of the AFM and towards the loss of morale among AFM personnel."

The report, "Career advancement in the Armed Forces of Malta", dated October 14, was released to the press yesterday.

Mr Sammut said that in the first half of last year, two promotion exercises were made. The first involved accelerated promotions to 34 members of the air and maritime squadrons who possessed specific qualifications and the second consisted of wide-ranging promotions to 345 soldiers in the various units of the AFM.

Seventy-seven soldiers subsequently complained to the Office of the Ombudsman. Mr Sammut said 29 of the cases were not upheld, 33 were accepted, nine were inadmissible for investigation and six were pending.

Mr Sammut said it had been standard practice in the armed forces during the last 30 years to issue promotions at irregular intervals and en masse.

On September 30, 1996, the ombudsman wrote to the commander, AFM, recommending that promotions be made at regular intervals, preferably quarterly, and the three regiments and headquarters should not be considered as closed units, so that all soldiers of the same rank could fill interchangeable posts. This recommendation had also been made by the Commission for the Investigation of Injustices in 1993.

The commander agreed on the first recommendation but he saw difficulties in implementing the second.

Mr Sammut said that "due to the change in administration" the next promotions exercise which had been due to take place by April 1997 instead took place in May 1998 and "as expected" it generated a substantial number of complaints.

In December, 2000, the commander informed the prime minister that following the May 1998 exercise, promotions in the AFM were to be guided by means of new procedures and criteria, with less weight being given to seniority in the promotion assessment reports (PAR) and to allow greater opportunities for career progression to persons with specialised qualifications. On this basis, minimum education and trade qualifications were set for eligibility for promotion.

Mr Sammut said one of the main causes of complaint stemmed from the fact that promotions had continued to be issued in large batches and irregularly, despite what was agreed in 1996. The commander had contended that it was impossible to make appointments on a regular basis before the full approved complement was reached.

But, Mr Sammut argued, "there are no valid reasons to justify this approach. Why should appointments to replace normal wastage not be issued in due time? As a direct consequence of these delays, appointments are then given to almost a fifth of AFM members with all the frustrations and suspicions that any such batch promotions normally generate."

Mr Sammut said the reintroduction without adequate advance notice of the minimum trade qualifications on the basis of a command order issued in 1971 but not applied since, was the cause of the greater share of complaints and confusion.

Treating the regiments and headquarters as distinct units for the purpose of promotion to posts which were common to each unit also led to injustice. Promotions were as a result dependent largely on the availability of posts within a unit and not on the merit of the candidate. It was a situation which also allowed for the possibility of jockeying for positions where vacancies were most likely to occur.

Mr Sammut said promotions were supposed to be awarded according to points scored in respect of set criteria. Yet high scorers may end up not being promoted because of a lack of vacancy in their unit, because they lacked the minimum qualifications for eligibility, or because they were not recommended.

"The requirement of a recommendation by a candidate's superior or reporting officer is considered subjective and renders the promotion assessment reports useless... Indeed, if the PAR is not serving its proper purpose, then the system should be dropped since it is unfair to state that promotions in the AFM are based on PAR points which could then be lost by a candidate with a high score who fails to secure a recommendation."

Mr Sammut said there were cases where a person was recommended for promotion for five consecutive years with glowing remarks regarding his performance standards and suitability in the annual performance reports, but who then was not recommended for promotion in the PAR. The commander had acknowledged this shortcoming and promised a review to eliminate glaring inconsistencies.

Mr Sammut said allowing "limited discretion" to the commander to promote an individual not on the basis of the approved points system could have a considerable damaging effect on the credibility of the promotions system. Although only one such case had come to his attention, it was known that this case had a strong negative impact on the morale of AFM personnel.

Mr Sammut said there had even been cases where the number of vacancies within a unit was not determined according to the approved staff complement, and personnel were placed in a way seen to block the promotion prospects of others.

"The award of promotions to personnel in possession of specialised qualifications is accepted, but the grant of accelerated promotions as a reward based on a subjective evaluation of the ability and merits of the chosen candidate lack transparency and gives rise to feelings of dissatisfaction and suspicion among AFM personnel" the ombudsman said.

Going into his proposed remedies, the ombudsman said most of the 33 cases his office had upheld concerned candidates who did not possess the minimum trade qualification and were considered ineligible for promotion.

He was recommending that the PAR of these candidates be reviewed so that those who scored higher points than the last promoted soldier in each respective rank would also be promoted. This entailed promoting not only those who had complained, but all those who achieved a high PAR score but were rejected for lack of trade qualification. The qualification requirement, the ombudsman said, was introduced without sufficient prior notice.

In a parting shot, the ombudsman wrote: "My experience with the armed forces in the last few years leads me to believe that the reluctance on the part of the commander AFM to accept and implement the recommendations by this office may leave aggrieved soldiers without a proper remedy. It is this hesitation to remedy manifestly unjust decisions as well as the various shortcomings in the way that the career advancement system of the AFM operates, that have contributed towards the general loss of confidence in the management of the Armed Forces of Malta and towards the loss of morale among AFM personnel."

He said his insistence on matters being remedied was motivated solely by his desire that the operational capability and level of preparedness of the AFM would be enhanced by virtue of an appreciation of the collective strength of all its members and of the individual contribution of each of them.