In his annual address to the parliament of April 30, President Emomali Rahmon announced his initiative to establish a Tajik ombudsman (national human rights institution), adding that Tajikistan shows its commitment to ratified conventions on human rights.

As guarantor of the Constitution, President Rahmon declared the season ripe for creating the ombudsman institution. The issue has been widely discussed in the country for some time now, including conferences with the participation of the former ombudsman of the Russian Federation, Oleg Mironov, but the proposal had to come from the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, during her official visit to Tajikistan of April 25-29. She insistently recommended that the president create an independent national human rights institution; and her message was greeted by Mr. Rahmon quite quickly – the very next day the right time for institution building had come.

In Tajikistan, experts argue the newly appointed office is likely to be just a showcase for the international community, but it is important to realize its considerable potential even in a restricted environment. One of its main roles, to promote and protect human rights, is important in overseeing the government and administration as to possible abuses of the power vested in them. And a strong and independent ombudsman institution can help prevent human rights violations and improve the government’s accountability. It could also be the proper vehicle for such simple things as recommending which office citizens should address their concerns to, and, if normal ways of defense are exhausted, to help citizens restore violated rights. While it is true that such important goals are unlikely to be achieved, the ombudsman can nevertheless fulfill his role to a certain extent, insofar as he is strong and charismatic.

As for the international context of the ombudsman, Tajikistan is part of various conventions and agreements such as the Convention on Protection of Human Rights, the Convention on the Rights of Children, the UN Women’s Convention and other similar pacts. Thus, an important function would be helping to bring national legislation into conformity with international standards by developing and improving national legislation for the protection of human rights. This could be furthered by educating, on the one hand, government and administration officials about their obligations and, on the other, the general public about their rights. More specifically, there is an important role to be played in the improvement of the Criminal Code, as in the case of Kazahstan, where the ombudsman is responsible for overseeing the law enforcement sector, even as far as access to verifying prisons. During Louise Arbour’s visit, she stressed precisely the importance of reforming the Criminal Code of Tajikistan and specifically to improve supervision of the procedures of detention and arrest of a person, so as to guarantee habeas corpus.

It should be kept in mind that all the advantages derived from a functional ombudsman institution are necessarily based on the independence, impartiality, objectivity, credibility, competence and prestige of the office. Equally important, this cannot be replicated inside the government, but only by enforcing its legal status as ombudsman, in accordance with international practice and previous success cases, not with the preferences of the powers that be – in the first place, the ombudsman has to act as a check to these powers, not their subordinate. This can only be achieved by recruiting competent staff and, most importantly, by perfecting the very process of electing or appointing the ombudsman himself, with a view to transparency. Especially in Tajikistan, complicated issues regarding the independence of the office may arise, the most obvious of which are budget restraints, staff shortages and inexperience, and these could be used to castrate the institution from the very beginning. More clearly, it faces the specific challenge of re-educating public servants to do things better than previously, and, again, this requires a high level of staff competence, coherent strategies and, of course, a lot of tolerance and patience. Finally, the success or failure of the institutions lies heavily in the strength of such allies as civil society organizations, independent human rights protection institutions and especially the free media, all of them real challenges for Tajikistan.

Some possibilities of acquiring this important status for the ombudsman should also be mentioned. First, the Tajik National Human Rights Institution can become independent by seeking legal and technical assistance from the OHCHR and other UN organizations. Although human rights institutions vary according to local context, one can learn a lot from the experiences of existing national human rights institutions – and, more importantly, one gains credibility by making a real effort to conform to international standards. Second, the OSCE is also very active in the region and can be a good point of reference: it can train people working for the ombudsman and assist in various other ways to strengthen the institution. To ensure the success of the office, the ombudsman should organize various roundtables, discussion plenums and other similar awareness- raising events between citizens and government representatives.