Cempaka Belanda: The Balkans' new zeal for protecting whistleblowers

"A Summary" – Apr 2, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Religion, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Intelligent/Benevolent Design, EU, South America, 5 Currencies, Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Middle East, Internet, Israel, Dictators, Palestine, US, Japan (Quake/Tsunami Disasters , People, Society ...), Nuclear Power Revealed, Hydro Power, Geothermal Power, Moon, Financial Institutes (Recession, Realign integrity values ..) , China, North Korea, Global Unity,..... etc.) - (Text version)

"The Timing of the Great Shift" – Mar 21, 2009 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) - (Text version)

“ … Here is another one. A change in what Human nature will allow for government. "Careful, Kryon, don't talk about politics. You'll get in trouble." I won't get in trouble. I'm going to tell you to watch for leadership that cares about you. "You mean politics is going to change?" It already has. It's beginning. Watch for it. You're going to see a total phase-out of old energy dictatorships eventually. The potential is that you're going to see that before 2013.
They're going to fall over, you know, because the energy of the population will not sustain an old energy leader ..."

"Update on Current Events" – Jul 23, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: The Humanization of God, Gaia, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Benevolent Design, Financial Institutes (Recession, System to Change ...), Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Nuclear Power Revealed, Geothermal Power, Hydro Power, Drinking Water from Seawater, No need for Oil as Much, Middle East in Peace, Persia/Iran Uprising, Muhammad, Israel, DNA, Two Dictators to fall soon, Africa, China, (Old) Souls, Species to go, Whales to Humans, Global Unity,..... etc.)

"The Recalibration of Awareness – Apr 20/21, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Old Energy, Recalibration Lectures, God / Creator, Religions/Spiritual systems (Catholic Church, Priests/Nun’s, Worship, John Paul Pope, Women in the Church otherwise church will go, Current Pope won’t do it), Middle East, Jews, Governments will change (Internet, Media, Democracies, Dictators, North Korea, Nations voted at once), Integrity (Businesses, Tobacco Companies, Bankers/ Financial Institutes, Pharmaceutical company to collapse), Illuminati (Started in Greece, with Shipping, Financial markets, Stock markets, Pharmaceutical money (fund to build Africa, to develop)), Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Women, Masters to/already come back, Global Unity.... etc.) - (Text version)

“… The Shift in Human Nature

You're starting to see integrity change. Awareness recalibrates integrity, and the Human Being who would sit there and take advantage of another Human Being in an old energy would never do it in a new energy. The reason? It will become intuitive, so this is a shift in Human Nature as well, for in the past you have assumed that people take advantage of people first and integrity comes later. That's just ordinary Human nature.

In the past, Human nature expressed within governments worked like this: If you were stronger than the other one, you simply conquered them. If you were strong, it was an invitation to conquer. If you were weak, it was an invitation to be conquered. No one even thought about it. It was the way of things. The bigger you could have your armies, the better they would do when you sent them out to conquer. That's not how you think today. Did you notice?

Any country that thinks this way today will not survive, for humanity has discovered that the world goes far better by putting things together instead of tearing them apart. The new energy puts the weak and strong together in ways that make sense and that have integrity. Take a look at what happened to some of the businesses in this great land (USA). Up to 30 years ago, when you started realizing some of them didn't have integrity, you eliminated them. What happened to the tobacco companies when you realized they were knowingly addicting your children? Today, they still sell their products to less-aware countries, but that will also change.

What did you do a few years ago when you realized that your bankers were actually selling you homes that they knew you couldn't pay for later? They were walking away, smiling greedily, not thinking about the heartbreak that was to follow when a life's dream would be lost. Dear American, you are in a recession. However, this is like when you prune a tree and cut back the branches. When the tree grows back, you've got control and the branches will grow bigger and stronger than they were before, without the greed factor. Then, if you don't like the way it grows back, you'll prune it again! I tell you this because awareness is now in control of big money. It's right before your eyes, what you're doing. But fear often rules. …”

Thursday, July 23, 2015

The Balkans' new zeal for protecting whistleblowers

Balkan countries vying to join the EU have passed, or are in the middle of passing, better whistleblower protection laws than most EU member states have. Ironically, the EU is co-financing this new anti-corruption zeal.

Deutsche Welle, 23 July 2015

It's impossible to fight corporate corruption if you don't know it is happening. But whistleblowers never get an easy ride, and their stories often end with the realization that if they'd known what they were getting themselves into, they wouldn't have become whistleblowers at all.

Visnja Marilovic was a bookkeeper at the Skenderija cultural and sports center in Sarajevo, when, one day in 2010, she was asked to process an invoice for a lot of beds. She realized that not only was her boss furnishing his new hotel with the company's money, but that evidence of corruption was passing across her desk every day. To Marilovic, reporting the crime wasn't whistleblowing - it was her job. "As a financial official, I was responsible for the documentation to be accurate and true," she told DW. "I thought I was protecting the company from disaster and my workplace altogether."

After googling how to file charges, and getting prosecutors to investigate, she assumed the director would be replaced and they could carry on working. Instead, she got fired and went through nearly three years of misery until her boss' trial finally began earlier this year. "I passed hell with my children and for two months I had to live under police protection because of threats," she said. "If I knew how much my kids had to suffer I would not have done it."

Progressive laws

Delegates from across the region
gathered at a Sarajevo hotel

With her life turned upside down, Marilovic now works at the Center for Responsible Democracy, a Sarajevo-based NGO that helped to draw up Bosnia's brand new whistleblower protection law - which came into effect in January this year. Bosnia is not the only country in the region that has written whistleblower protection into its legislation in the past few years - so have Romania, Serbia, Kosovo, Moldova, and Montenegro. Albania is in the middle of passing one through its parliament, while the Bulgarian government last year released an in-depth report that includes legislative proposals.

It all amounts to a surge of legislative activity in the region that was distilled a few weeks ago in a windowless hotel conference room in downtown Sarajevo. Legislators, government advisers, ministry officials, NGO workers, and actual whistleblowers came together for a conference organized by the international NGO "Blueprint for Free Speech" and the Regional Anti-Corruption Initiative (RAI) to compare whistleblower protection notes.

"Countries like Bosnia, long thought of as more economically backward, are now moving forward more seriously on whistleblower protection than Western European countries," said Suelette Dreyfus, executive director of Blueprint for Free Speech. "If Western Europe doesn't lift its game, it will end up being left behind in the dust."

The irony is of course that many of these efforts are being co-financed by the European Union, even though Germany, France, Spain, and Portugal, for instance, have no dedicated whistleblower protection laws.

Meanwhile, Blueprint's Mark Worth, who says he has studied around 70 whistleblower laws and draft laws around the world, explained the priorities to those assembled: "The three things a whistleblower needs are: a place to disclose information, protection from retaliation, and for the thing to be investigated. The law has to create loophole-free provisions and mechanisms for those three things to be covered."

Curing the cancer

Deputy Justice Minister Idlir Peci is
about to get Albania's new whistleblower
protection law through parliament

In the heat of the summer afternoon, with phrases like "Can we at least agree that pre-court protection is necessary?" flying across the conference room, the Albanian Deputy Justice Minister Idlir Peci, his shirt-sleeves rolled up, explained that he had been stung by his country's terrible record on corruption.

"I spent 20 years in the Netherlands, and I decided to come back to my country because I saw a will to change things," he told DW. "I think all the countries in the region are tired of being dragged down. And I think the politicians are also realizing they cannot hide behind their fingers and sell beautiful stories to the public without really accomplishing these beautiful stories."

But where is this new energy coming from? "My motivation comes from all the reports, especially from Transparency International, but also all kinds of other rankings, where Albania scores very badly," he said. "And from the public perception that corruption is a cancer in society that has to be cured."

A polite nudge from the EU

Yavor Siderov, advisor to the Bulgarian deputy prime minister, was making similar noises: "There seems to be a very concerted effort with regards to anti-corruption and whistleblowing, which is amazing. It's a very positive trend, given that the Balkans are constantly being given as examples of rampant corruption."

Both Peci and Siderov also said that the competition to join the EU was acting as a spur - as was the money the EU offers to help fund the laws. "It's always a good thing to have the European Union provide you with a polite nudge down the road of transparency and anti-corruption," said Siderov.

As the conference wound down, Mark Worth delivered a closing pep talk to encourage the assembled legislators. "It's a very delicate issue, and I'm hearing a lot of tentativeness," he told the various delegations. "I think you should be brave, because the whistleblower's being brave."

But as Marina Micunovic, a senior advisor at the Montenegro Ministry of Justice, underlined afterwards, the point of a whistleblower law is to end the need for bravery: "At the moment, we are just applauding the ones who are brave, but they are not our target group," she said. "We need to encourage the ones who are afraid."

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