In Ukraine, for the first time, a court made a decision to pay a reward to a whistleblower, which became an important precedent in the fight against corruption crimes. The amount of the reward amounted to more than 1.68 million hryvnias. About this reported press service of the National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption (NACP).
As noted in the NAKC, the reward was received by a serviceman who in the period of 2020-2021 held the position of director of the internal audit department of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine. He managed to expose a serious corruption scheme and went through a difficult path to bring the matter to an end.
In 2020, this whistleblower applied to the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) with a statement about receiving an offer of 24 million UAH from representatives of a commercial company for acting in their interests. Thanks to his statement, an investigation was launched, as a result of which, in 2023, the former deputy head of one of the departments of the Ministry of Defense was sentenced to 4.5 years in prison. At first, the whistleblower was refused a reward, but later the decision was revised.
The case is the first practical implementation of the provisions of the law, which took effect in 2020, under which whistleblowers are guaranteed compensation and protection from liability in the event of inaccuracies in their reports. This law also provides important mechanisms for anonymous reporting of corruption.
In addition, since September 2023, the Unified Whistleblower Portal has been operating in Ukraine, which gives citizens the opportunity to report facts of corruption while maintaining confidentiality.
