A Haifa resident, of Greek-Catholic denomination, asked the Office of the Ombudsman to help her change the registration of her family status in the Population Registry. According to her, she had discovered that for over 35 years she had been registered in the Population Registry as married, despite her never having been married. The complainant added that she had asked the Population Authority, some time ago, to rectify her alleged erroneous registration, but the Authority had made the change in registration contingent on her providing a declaratory judgement as to her family status.
In the course of the Office of the Ombudsman's investigation, an attempt was made to trace the reason for the complainant's registration as "married". It transpired that the Ministry of the Interior was unable to provide the document or marriage certificate on the basis of which the registration had been changed, since in the 1990s the Ministry had not retained formal documents relating to a change in the family status of residents, and even to date did not keep them, despite their being of high importance.
The Office explained to the complainant that it was unable to instruct the Authority to change the registration relating to her family status on the basis of the documents that she had provided, and that she would have to comply with the Population Authority's demand. Notwithstanding, the Office pointed out to the Population Authority the need to retain copies of the formal documents relating to the family status of residents, on the basis of which changes were made to the Registry.
Following the Office of the Ombudsman's intervention, a general systemic rectification was carried out, and the Population Authority issued a directive relating to the duty to retain a copy of every public certificate that was filed for updating family status in the Population Registry.