Andreja Bizjak, the former long-time director of inspection at the Administration for Food Safety, Veterinary Medicine and Plant Protection, is to become the new acting director general of the administration. Photo: Matjaž Rušt
Will Andreja Bizjak temporarily lead the Food Safety Authority?
The new Acting Director General of the Administration for Safe Food, Veterinary Medicine and Plant Protection (UVHVVR) is to become the long-time director of inspection at the administration, Andreja Bizjak. She confirmed for Dnevnik that she is ready to accept this position, which was offered to her by Minister of Agriculture Janez Cigler Kralj. The final decision rests with the government, which appoints the general director of UVHVVR.
After Golob’s government dismissed the general director of UVHVVR at the end of January this year due to a serious cyber incident Vido Sweatas of February 1, Boštjan Vidic is the acting general manager. Vidic also applied for the position of director with a full mandate, but he did not pass the psychological test of managerial skills, which is why he received a negative evaluation from the special tender committee of the board of officials. The new Minister of Agriculture Janez Cigler Kralj he wanted to be in this position Andreja Bizjak.
Guček degraded her
Bizjakova has been employed at UVHVVR since 1995. First as a veterinary inspector, and from 2013 to 2021 she was the director of the inspection. She was considered a very strict boss, so she was not the most popular among some employees. In April 2021, the then General Director Matjaž Gucek dismissed her and, since he assessed that she did not need her knowledge and experience, ordered her to work at home. He subsequently demoted her completely, and in May 2023, Golob’s government deemed that he was no longer needed and dismissed him early. But after a few weeks, Guček triumphantly returned to the head of the UVHVVR – at that time as the deputy of Vida Znoj, who was acting general director for a year, after which the government granted her a full, five-year mandate. But at the end of January of this year, the affair with the loopholed information system took away both Znojeva and Gučka.
When the public tender for the general director of UVHVVR was announced in the spring of 2024, we asked Bizjakova if she would apply for it. “It never crossed my mind to apply for this position. The administration has changed so much in the last three years that it is unrecognizable. It is no longer an institution in which one would happily work for the public good, that is, for the good of consumers. It operates on a minimal scale, the goals it stands for are not visible, and above all it does not operate transparently,” Andreja Bizjak told Dnevnik in May 2024. When she retired in July of the same year, she explained this decision to our newspaper as follows: “I did my homework. If the situation at the administration had been different, I would have stayed, but that’s how I decided to leave.”
Despite her retirement, Andreja Bizjak remained active in numerous European projects to strengthen food safety and animal health in third countries, which are tendered by the European Commission.
What will happen to the equine sanctuary?
It will be interesting to see how the administration will act later, if Andreja Bizjak really leads it. For example, the procedure for granting a ten-year concession for a shelter for equids is open, about which Bizjakova has concerns. In July last year, she emphasized for Dnevnik that farmed animals deserve to be raised without pain and suffering. “But they are farmed because they themselves and their products are intended for human consumption, not for shelter care. What is the goal of the shelter: for the cow to stay there for fifteen years and the horse for thirty years? The horse has always been primarily intended for work, i.e. for driving, working in the forest, it may have been intended for sport and in some European countries, but not everywhere, also for human consumption. It was a farm animal,” said Andreja Bizjak and also wondered what makes ungulates so special that they deserve a shelter, while other animals do not.
“A horse suffers no less or no more than cattle, pigs or chickens. I think that the equine shelter is some kind of partial solution to please someone. Concessions for veterinary organizations are already under scrutiny as to whether they were properly tendered or not. “I can’t even imagine how they will tender a concession at the equine shelter without favoring one association,” Andreja Bizjak thought last summer. The recently published tender for the granting of the concession was just as Bizjakova feared it would be. The current candidate for the new general director of UVHVVR, who will have to provide money for the operation of the shelter, remarked after the announcement of the tender: “The public tender is only the last act of the parliamentary amendment to the law on animal protection, which serves a single non-governmental organization – the Society for the Protection of Horses Natalija Nedeljko. I believe she will take good care of the animals. At the same time, I believe that in this way the state will take good care of the financial well-being of Mrs. Nedeljko, who certainly ‘deserved’ it, as she also received a visit and attention from Prime Minister Robert Golob and his wife,” she remarked.
Will Minister Janez Cigler Kralj consult with Bizjakova before signing the concession act (the signature should otherwise be in the domain of the government, not the Ministry of Agriculture), if the government appoints her as acting director of the UVHVVR? Last July, the shelter for equidae was brought into the law on animal protection through a side door, just before its approval in the National Assembly, by some animal protectors with the support of the coalition MPs at the time.
