WT Sofia comments on adoption of Bulgaria’s Whistleblowing Act

Wolf Theiss Sofia has recently provided its analysis on the newly adopted Bulgarian Whistleblowing Act, which was adopted at the end of January 2023 after prolonged and intense discussions.

Soon after the Bulgarian Whistleblowing Act was published in the State Gazette, the WT Sofia team, led by Partner Anna Rizova and including Counsels Hristina Dzhevlekova and Oleg Temnikov drafted an article for Bulgaria’s leading online and print media outlet, Kapital.bg, elaborating on the specifics of how the European Whistleblowing Directive has been implemented in Bulgarian legislation.

The article provides details on the specific ways in which the new Act impacts employers and undertakings, covering as many legal hypotheses as possible, together with some real-life scenarios.

“A great part of the Bulgarian Act is dedicated to ensuring whistleblowers identity’s confidentiality. It is not by chance that the central Bulgarian reporting body will be the Personal Data Protection Commission, which will in turn be audited by the Ombudsman. Whether that was the best option was the subject of many discussions in the drafting process. Initial drafts envisaged that body to be the Anti-Corruption Commission. With very few exceptions, Bulgaria still hasn’t developed such external alert systems, although its law enforcement bodies have similar functions. Unfortunately, the Act was adopted only in the last days of the 48^th National Assembly, when the Parliament was unable to amend the budget so as to envisage the funds and resources that the Personal Data Protection Commission would need to undertake its new role.”

You can read more on the Bulgarian Whistleblowing Act in the full article here, translating it in your preferred language: Българският Whistleblowing Act: Какво трябва да знаят работодателите (capital.bg)

You can also listen to Oleg Temnikov (WT) discussing the matter on the Bulgarian National Radio’s programme Before All: Адв. Олег Темников: Законът за защита на лицата, подаващи сигнали за нарушения, не е в полза на доносците, а на обществения интерес – От деня (bnr.bg)

The Wolf Theiss Whistleblowing Directive Tracker maintains an up-to-date list of implementation status of the Directive across Cental and Eastern Europe: Whistleblowing Directive Tracker – WT (wolftheiss.com)