Only one in three citizens who consider themselves victims of abuse by state institutions have filed complaints and petitions to defend their rights, according to data from the "Be informed, NOT abused!" project, run by The Foundation For The Defense Of Citizens Against State Abuses. According to the answers obtained to the FACIAS survey, between April and July, 72% of the respondents consider that they have been victims, at least once, of an abuse by a Romanian state institution and only 9% consider that they have not been victims of such abuses. On the other hand, of these, only 32% have filed petitions and complaints, while 12% have drawn the attention of the institution by other means (verbal), 11% have appealed to the courts, and 25% of victims have not taken any action.
Most of those who answered the questions in the questionnaire believe that they know their rights well enough, but in practice far fewer are able to correctly identify abuses or potentially abusive situations. 35.5% of respondents say they know their rights very little or not at all; 52% believe they know their rights well enough, while 12.5% say they know their rights very well when dealing with state institutions. Out of the several hundred situations reported to FACIAS in the project, only 5-7% of them represent potentially abusive situations. The situations reported as abuses are regrettable, but the vast majority of them do not meet the conditions of a case of abuse by a state institution, but are private disputes.
The interim results of the public opinion survey on abuses by public institutions are available at: https://www.facias.ro/raport-public-de-activitate-in-cadrul-proiectului-pentru-perioada-aprilie-iulie-2021/ . Since the Project's initiation, FACIAS has received several hundred messages from citizens reporting various problems they face. By mid-July, support was only requested for individual cases, not for collective cases. Only in the last three weeks, the project team has received complaints also pointing to potential abuses committed by state institutions, or their representatives, with collective victims. This is also due to the Practical Guide for Combating Abuse by State Institutions, which, at this time, deals with these types of collective abuse.
The "Be informed, NOT abused!" project aims to inform citizens about: their rights in relation to state institutions; identifying and dealing with abuses when they are committed; getting to know organisations and institutions that can provide support in the fight against such abuses.
FACIAS provides, on request and to the extent possible, support and advice to victims (mainly collective cases) of abuse by state institutions and collaborates with state institutions in identifying and promoting best practices in this field. The project aims, implicitly, at stimulating the civic involvement of Romanian citizens, increasing the degree of responsibility and involvement in issues of national interest concerning the violation of their rights by state institutions.
As part of the project, FACIAS has also produced a practical guide to support citizens in their dealings with state institutions, supported by the current legislation.
The step-by-step guide can be found at https://www.facias.ro/proiecte-2/ . So far, the Guide has provided information, in simplified language, on the tools that we, as citizens, can use, free of charge, in relation to state institutions, without having to go to court. It is about individual cases where an individual or a legal person is affected by individual administrative acts: How to tell if there is an abuse; Minimum criteria to identify a potential abusive situation; Access to justice is provided to us by laws, through state institutions or through courts; How to get justice at no cost: petition, complaint and preliminary complaint; How to ask for information of public interest, useful for our interest to prevent/fight against an abuse committed by a state institution, under Law 544/2001; Defense, with minimal costs, or even free of charge, in court; etc.