The “People’s Defender” (a type of ombudsman or public defender) will be one year old next 15 May. In this first year of action, “the people have overflowed” in search of help in channeling their needs, with more than 2,000 cases attended, most of which have been solved, according to the head of the office, Zoila Martinez. According to Martinez, the requests are linked to the need for medical insurance for the elderly, deficiencies in the electric supply, requests for pensions, or a pensions increase for public and private workers, and lawsuits for the lack of water. “But complaints, which are of all kinds, from neighborhood boards, from everything…,” she said in a visit to the director of Diario Libre, Adriano Miguel Tejada. The official, who had to start from scratch in this project that was given to her, tells how it has been a year of hard work. “The toughest part has been to create a team with the same vision, the same vocation, the same desire to serve, to be useful, the same commitment. It has been very hard,” she stressed.