Hello everyone.
I am a former development aid worker. I am currently involved in a court case to rectify my wrongful dismissal. I worked for a large children's Non-Government Organization (NGO - which has to remain anonymous due to court proceedings) and whilst I was working there, I reported a large amount of bullying, health and safety issues, and HR problems.
This not only affected me but many people in our office including expatriate and local workers. Nothing was done to protect any of us and on one occasion, someone’s health was seriously risked because of this bullying. I was warned by a few people that if I complained I would be fired; I did not believe them as I trusted the organization given that they work in child protection.
After making the complaint formal, I was subsequently fired and told I was not fit for the organization. This all happened before any investigation happened and I was heavily victimized in the weeks running up to my dismissal. I have since learned I was not the first person to be fired for reporting bullying in the organization.
The irony is that whilst I was working there, I was asked to develop a fundraising proposal for a project to train children on how to act as whistle blowers for bullying behavior.
The irony is clear. When I found myself in a whistle blowing situation, I was first victimized and then fired; there was no support, no protection, and no investigation. It was only after I was fired that they investigated the matter, and unsurprisingly, their investigation report claimed (incorrectly) that no bullying had occurred.
Luckily, I do not need very much for the legal fees as my lawyer has taken on my case pro bono as he strongly believes in my case. Without his help, I could not have afforded to take this any further. Unfortunately, I do still need some help with costs. I am fundraising for the court application fees and the fees I will need to pay a barrister to represent me in court, who cannot work pro bono.
I have been told at times to let this case go as the costs, stress, and psychological fatigue of going to court is extremely high; and this is true. Prior to this court case, the case was presented at an employment tribunal and I used all of my savings to get through that part of the case. I was not able to go straight to court without having gone through that legal process and I chose to hire a lawyer for that stage. I have not been able to get a job since this all happened in the first few months of this year as I have been left with severe depression from all of this. This should not happen after working for a children’s organization.
So why am I not letting this go? Well it is simple. The organization I worked for aims to protect children. It cannot claim to do this if it cannot protect its own staff from bullying within the organization. If this were a private company that had behaved this way, then perhaps I would have let this go. But this is an organization that actively aims to protect children. Behaving like this towards their staff is morally wrong; it is injustice. This should not be happening in any organization, and it is unbelievable that it can happen in a Children's organization. And this cannot happen again. Hopefully after this case, the organization will make the right changes to stop this from happening again. As I said, this should not be happening and I hope that my actions will help prevent this from happening to other people in the future.
Thank you in advance to anyone who can help with this. In a perfect world, legal costs would not be so prohibitive in searching out for justice. In this imperfect yet wonderful world, it is organizations like fundedjustice.com and people like you, who help on here that rectify this.
Sam
