The South East Europe (SEE) Coalition on Whistleblower Protection held its second Annual Meeting organized by the Regional Anti-corruption Initiative (RAI) and Blueprint for Free Speech (BPfFS) with support of the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC), in Zagreb’s Double Tree by Hilton today.
The event builds on the results achieved so far, providing additional boost to the promotion and protection of whistleblowers in the region. It contributes to the overall efforts challenging the national governments to seek better legal solutions and to work more intensively on establishing policy implementation mechanisms.
“The regional dimension of the Coalition shall enable its members not only to learn from each other, but most importantly to coordinate and synchronize actions amongst them in order to raise to its highest extent the awareness on whistleblowing importance” said Radu Cotici, RCC expert on Governance for Growth, in his opening remarks, and emphasized: “Civil society can play a crucial role in this regard. It is also a target of the SEE 2020 Strategy and a conclusion of the Survey Public Attitudes to Whistleblowing, which the RCC will release very soon.”
Mark Worth, Coalition Coordinator gives the overall view and impression: „After years of international work on building coalitions and networks across the world, I can underline that this is a most successful coalition building process I participated in. We are thankful for the recognition and the support of RAI and RCC in the Coalition building.”
Dr. Suelette Dreyfus, an academic and researcher from BPfFS, emphasized that the Coalition provides a case study that it is possible to make a difference. “The idea of building the Coalition started some two years ago and the progress to date has been excellent with strong impact in the region,” added Ms. Dreyfus.
Jasna Panjeta, Program and Outreach Officer at said that Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative, as an Anti-Corruption Dimension Coordinator for SEE2020 Strategy, is committed to raising awareness about whistleblowing. “We are especially proud of facilitating the establishment and development of the Coalition. RAI is working with the civil society as well as governments and this year we also branched into producing the Documentary about Whistleblowing with the objective to reach out to general public in SEE economies about the value and importance of whistleblowing”.
The meeting gathered approximately 20 civil society organisations, public-interest activists and investigative journalists, from the SEE. It aimed at fostering sustainability of the Coalition by ensuring a platform for furthering the organizational development and building.
The Coalition, established in December 2015 is comprised of organizations and individuals from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Kosovo*, Republic of Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Czech Republic and Hungary. It is the world’s first regional initiative dedicated to enhancing whistleblower rights and protections, and promoting whistleblowing as an effective anti-corruption tool. It serves as an umbrella for activism, legislation and policy development, whistleblower support and advice, public and media outreach, as well as a network for exchanging expertise and information.
