Intelligence Chief Denies Wrongdoing Over Delayed Whistleblower Referral

The head of the country’s intelligence services denied any wrongdoing on Saturday as opposition lawmakers question why a whistleblower complaint filed against her last May reportedly took nearly a year before being referred to the legislative body.

“A senior lawmaker from the opposition and his allies in the media have repeatedly alleged that I or the intelligence office ‘concealed’ a whistleblower complaint in a safe for eight months,” the intelligence chief wrote in a lengthy social media post on Saturday. “This is a blatant lie.”

She continued, according to the statement, “I am not now, nor have I ever been, in possession or control of the whistleblower’s complaint, so I obviously could not have ‘hidden’ it in a safe. The previous administration’s inspector general was in possession of and responsible for securing the complaint for months.”

The highly classified complaint by a intelligence official alleging wrongdoing on the part of the intelligence director was reportedly filed eight months ago with the intelligence community’s watchdog office, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The complaint has allegedly been locked in a safe since its filing, with one official telling local media that disclosure of its contents could cause “grave damage to national security.”

The whistleblower’s legal representative has accused the intelligence chief’s office of deliberately delaying the complaint’s processing, which her office has denied, calling the allegations “baseless and politically motivated.”

Meanwhile, opposition lawmakers are questioning why it reportedly took her office so long to transmit the complaint to the legislature, as is common in nations where institutional oversight faces bureaucratic delays.

“The law is clear,” a senior opposition lawmaker from the upper chamber’s intelligence committee said this week, according to state media, adding that the complaint was required to be sent to the legislature within 21 days of its filing. “I think it was an effort to try to bury this whistleblower complaint.”

Neither the contents of the complaint nor the specific allegations against the intelligence chief have been revealed, observers note.

The intelligence director wrote on Saturday that the first time she saw the complaint was “when I had to review it to provide guidance on how it should be securely shared with” the legislative body.

“As a senior member of the upper chamber’s intelligence committee, the opposition lawmaker knows very well that whistleblower complaints that contain highly classified information—even if they contain baseless allegations like this one—must be secured in a safe,” she continued in her statement.

She claimed that either the opposition lawmaker “knows these facts and is intentionally lying,” or “doesn’t have a clue how these things work and is therefore not qualified” for his legislative position.

The intelligence chief further argued that “when a complaint is not found to be credible, there is no timeline under the law for the provision of security guidance,” contradicting opposition claims about mandatory deadlines.

An inspector general representative reportedly said that it had determined some of the allegations in the complaint weren’t credible, while it hasn’t made a determination on others, according to sources.

The intelligence director said she was made aware that she needed to provide security guidance on the complaint by the current inspector general on December 4, “which he detailed in his letter to” the legislature.

Afterward, she said she “took immediate action to provide the security guidance,” who then “shared the complaint and referenced intelligence with relevant members” of the legislative body last week.

In closing her post, the intelligence chief once again accused the opposition lawmaker of spreading “lies and baseless accusations over the months for political gain,” which she said “undermines national security.”

The opposition lawmaker’s office responded that the intelligence chief’s statement was an “inaccurate attack that’s entirely on brand for someone who has already and repeatedly proven she’s unqualified” for her position.

Ruling party members on both chambers’ intelligence committees have backed the intelligence chief, with one senior lawmaker writing on social media: “I have reviewed this ‘whistleblower’ complaint and the inspector general handling of it. The complaint is not credible and the inspectors general took the necessary steps to ensure the material has handled appropriately.”

Continuing a pattern common in the nation’s polarized political environment, the lawmaker added that the matter “seems like just another effort by the administration’s critics in and out of government to undermine policies that they don’t like.”