ADVOCACY

Whistleblowers usually face dire consequences for their actions and in Slovenia their fate is no different. Meanwhile, we still have no institutional mechanisms to protect these people properly. Moreover, Slovenia ranks very low in numerous international surveys and studies that researched how seriously countries take prosecution of major criminal activity or corruption, especially in sectors like economy. To uphold The Rule of Law (the principles of the state of law), an efficient judicial system is necessary while Slovenia is lagging significantly behind more successful European countries since in spite the EU Directive regarding the protection of persons who report breaches of Union Law (“Whistleblowing Directive”), Slovenia still hasn’t proposed any official strategy on how to include new content and introduce the necessary changes into Slovenian legal system so that it is compatible with the EU Directive.

The fact that very few of these cases end up in court, much less see a favorable epilogue for those who exposed even very serious wrongdoings, is another reason why whistleblowers additionally face other types of social and professional exclusion, not just from their workplace, but social life as well, and in the end these people, their stories as well as their more than legitimate grievances are obliterated from public memory. However, if do not fix this, Slovenia cannot evolve into a healthier and more prosperous society.

In this spirit, EISEP, an independent expert organization, joined forces with Ivan Gale, currently the most famous Slovenian whistleblower, to constructively contribute to the public debate around whistleblowers, how to better protect them and what is their role in our society. Additionally, we want to reach out to public bodies as well as NGO’s and encourage them to establish more efficient mechanisms for implementing compliance-based ethics at their workplace, which is also a growing trend in Europe and around the world. Last but not least, seeking out professionals who can point out the aspects of the phenomenon of whistleblowing that clearly require specific expertise, brings the necessary counterbalance to this heavily politicized issue.

The Center for the Protection of Whistleblowers also wishes to support Slovenian NGO’s and relevant public bodies that are already doing important work as well as actively participate in generating more awareness around these issues, build a more accurate public image of who the whistleblowers are and why advocacy is so important, which we we hope to achieve primarily through having a dialogue with relevant authorized institutions, setting up various initiatives and suggesting improvements regarding particular and systemic (legislative) solutions.