Pleas to disregard 2023 civil service evaluations

Pleas continued to be made to disregard civil service evaluations for 2023, as civil service head Elena Oikonomidou Azina said on Wednesday that discussions in parliament about the new civil service evaluation system were occurring without any data.

Azina spoke during a session of the House finance committee and was supported by representatives of civil service union Pasydy.

The union said promotions made using the 2023 evaluation should be done on a trial basis and that the evaluations should not be necessarily relied upon. They said they expect many appeals on judgements and a possible problem in the proper functioning of the civil service due to errors and objections.

One out of every ten workers evaluated has filed an objection to his or her evaluation, they added.

The representatives also reported rumours that appeal-reviewers are told not to view appeals of evaluations marked 8 or higher and, at the same time, they are not required to give reasons for their decisions regarding the appeal.

They pointed out problems that would arise before the evaluation even started and requested a trial application from then on in a memorandum the union submitted on June 23 to the president and on September 19 to the finance minister.

Last week, the union told MPs of a series of ‘distortions’ in the new system, which leaves the door open for a wave of formal objections by affected civil servants.

Pasydy does not want to go back to the old system of evaluations, its leader Stratis Matthaiou stressed, but only to iron out the kinks in the new system and then implement it.

Evaluators were not properly trained for their task, he said while speaking of “poor preparation” for the new system.

There have been instances of threats made to both evaluators and civil servants subject to evaluation, according to Matthaiou.

“Some [evaluators] applied very strict and vindictive criteria,” he said.