chargement...
Moroccan-Dutch team chief Fatima Aboulouafa is a whistleblower, who decided to denounce discrimination within the Dutch police organization. However, her complaints were ignored by the authorities.
On Monday, Karim Aachboun who is Fatima Aboulouafa’s lawyer, announced that his client is accusing Dutch Minister of Justice and Security Ferdinand Grapperhaus of defamation.
Abouloufa’s complaint comes after the Minister wrote a letter to the Dutch House of Representatives last week, claiming that the Dutch-Moroccan’s departure from the police is unrelated to her substantive criticism of the alleged abuses within the body, according to a Dutch news channel.
«It cannot be that a manager is punished because she has acted in good faith with regard to the abuses reported to her within the police», Aachboun argued. According to the lawyer, Aboulouafa was indeed «punished» for denouncing racism, abuse of power and bullying within the police organization and the «wall of silence» surrounding similar incidents.
After she was put on leave, the whistleblower was told last week that she can no longer return to her office in Leiden, where she used to head a unit of 130 police officers.
Aboulouafa’s story made headlines in the Netherlands after an Instagram post she published in June. In her post, the police officer who worked for 23 years for the Dutch police, referred to the way in which some police officers are treated in the country.
Her post which was seen as highly critical, was not well received by police leaders in Leiden, who told her that her presence causes unrest among unit leaders, sector leaders and team leaders.
