This article is part of IIU's Integrity Champions Spotlight series, designed to highlight integrity best practices that GCF Direct Access Entities are developing and implementing. This series will showcase these best practices and provide some lessons learnt for other Direct Access Entities who may be interested in establishing similar systems.

After attending the GCF Independent Integrity Unit’s regional workshop in Viet Nam in April last year, Budi Nugroho concluded that his organisation's whistleblower mechanism needed any upgrade.

Budi is the Internal Auditor for Kemitraan, an NGO in Indonesia that envisions improvement of good governance practices through partnerships with the government, civil society organizations, and corporations, in Indonesia and beyond. Kemitraan has been a Direct Access Entity (DAE) with the Green Climate Fund since 2020, equipped to receive finance for small-scale projects. 

Budi was one of 25 representatives from DAEs across South and Southeast Asia who attended this regional workshop. The participants enhanced their understanding of their obligations under GCF integrity policies, learned how to strengthen the integrity function of their organisations, and developed action plans. One workshop session focused on the accessibility of whistleblower systems on DAE websites, assessing the ease of locating and the user-friendliness of the complaint submission process. In his action plan for Kemitraan, Budi listed improving this system as one of his goals.

Back in Indonesia, Budi and his colleagues began by reviewing Kemitraan's whistleblower policy and procedures to ensure that they were aligned with those from GCF and other donors. Then, using the feedback from the workshop, Budi identified the changes that needed to be made to improve their whistleblowing system. He and his team developed a form for people to submit their complaints directly online, including an option to submit a complaint anonymously. They also set up a dedicated email address for submitting complaints, limiting access to the email box and the complaints from the organisation's side to those involved in investigating these complaints. They also set up a phone line for people who wish to report by call or text.

This significant overhaul was a team effort. As Budi described, it involved working closely with the communications and website teams, who were responsible for making the content visually accessible and usable for website visitors. Colleagues from Kemitraan’s project teams were also consulted to make sure that the revised whistleblower system was in line with requirements from other donors, in addition to GCF. 

Even though the revised whistleblower mechanism is now up and running on the website, the work is not yet done. When Budi spoke with his colleagues about the system, he realised that there needed to be “more efforts to socialise the mechanism” both inside and outside the office. Sensitising stakeholders about the system is important to ensure transparency in the complaints process and encourage proactive reporting of integrity risks. 

The Kemitraan team is approaching stakeholder engagement in two prongs: internal and external. For the 58 staff members, information about the whistleblower mechanism will be integrated into an internal online training platform. “Everyone who joins Kemitraan will go through this e-learning process and will need to pass this course,” Executive Director Nurina Widagdo said. 

For external stakeholders, like community members at Kemitraan projects sites around Indonesia, Budi will hold workshops about the whistleblower mechanism when he does his project audit visits. These meetings are set to begin this year. 

Engaging with communities about this process will be especially helpful as Kemitraan prepares a project in coordination with GCF. Stemming from an approved GCF Project Preparation Facility application, this project, titled Building Flood Resilient Community through Adaptive Livelihood and Runoff Management in the Petanglong Area of the Central Java Province of Indonesia (abbreviated as BRAVE), intends to both strengthen people's livelihoods and restore ecosystems to help with flood resilience. There will be many stakeholders involved, and it will be important that everyone understands the whistleblower mechanism to help with mitigating any possible integrity risks.

Other GCF Accredited Entities looking to speak with Kemitraan about their work should contact Budi Nugroho at budi.nugroho@kemitraan.or.id