Violeta Bulc (born 24 January 1964) is a Slovenian politician who served as the

European Commissioner for Transport The European Commissioner for Transport is a member of the European Commission whose portfolio includes the planning and development of homogeneous transport policies and regulations across the Union, of the Trans-European Transport Network as w ...

from 2014 to 2019.

Early life

Bulc earned a bachelor's degree in computer science and informatics at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering,

University of Ljubljana The University of Ljubljana ( sl, Univerza v Ljubljani, , la, Universitas Labacensis), often referred to as UL, is the oldest and largest university in Slovenia. It has approximately 39,000 enrolled students. History Beginnings Although certain ...

, Slovenia, as well as a master's degree in information technology at the

Golden Gate University Golden Gate University (GGU or Golden Gate) is a private university in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1901, GGU specializes in educating professionals through its schools of law, business, taxation, and accounting. The university offers s ...

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

. She then worked from 1991 to 1994 as an expert for

wide area network A wide area network (WAN) is a telecommunications network that extends over a large geographic area. Wide area networks are often established with leased telecommunication circuits. Businesses, as well as schools and government entities, u ...

s performance analyses at DHL in Burlingame, California. In 1994 she returned to Slovenia, where she worked as the manager of institutional traffic (until 1997) and then the director of carrier business (until 1999) for Telekom Slovenia. From 1999 to 2000 she was the vice-president of Telemach, a major telecommunications provider, and from 2000 to 2014 the CEO of Vibacom, Sustainable Strategies and Innovation Ecosystems.

Politics

Bulc joined Slovenian politics together with

Miro Cerar Miroslav Cerar Jr. (, known as Miro Cerar ;) is a Slovenian law professor and politician. He was Prime Minister of Slovenia, leading the 12th Government. He served as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs in the 13th Governmen ...

in 2013, and she was appointed head of the program committee of the Miro Cerar Party. Bulc served as a minister without portfolio responsible for development, strategic projects and cohesion and as deputy prime minister from 19 September 2014 until 1 November 2014 in the

centre-left Centre-left politics lean to the left on the left–right political spectrum but are closer to the centre than other left-wing politics. Those on the centre-left believe in working within the established systems to improve social justice. The ...

cabinet of Miro Cerar.

Other activities

Starting from 2022, she became a board member of the Joint European Disruptive Initiative.

Critique over esotericism

On 10 October 2014, the

Slovenian government The politics of Slovenia takes place in a framework of a Parliamentary system, parliamentary Representative democracy, representative democratic republic, whereby the Prime Minister of Slovenia is the head of government, and of a multi-party sys ...

announced that Bulc would be Slovenia's nominee for the position of the European Commissioner on the Juncker Commission, replacing Alenka Bratušek. Bulc was criticized because of her esoteric views, including

necromancy Necromancy () is the practice of magic or black magic involving communication with the dead by summoning their spirits as apparitions or visions, or by resurrection for the purpose of divination; imparting the means to foretell future even ...

. After a confirmation hearing in front of the

European Parliament The European Parliament (EP) is one of the legislative bodies of the European Union and one of its seven institutions. Together with the Council of the European Union (known as the Council and informally as the Council of Ministers), it adopts ...

's Committee on Transport and Tourism, Bulc was assigned the transport portfolio.

References

External links

* , - 1964 births Golden Gate University alumni Living people Modern Centre Party politicians Politicians from Ljubljana Slovenian European Commissioners University of Ljubljana alumni Women European Commissioners Women government ministers of Slovenia European Commissioners 2014–2019 21st-century Slovenian women politicians 21st-century Slovenian politicians Deputy Prime Ministers of Slovenia {{Slovenia-politician-stub