(Podgorica, 29 March 2012) – Tomorrow, MANS will submit to the Special State Prosecutor for Organized Crime and Corruption, Đurđina Ivanović, criminal charges against Podgorica mayor Miomir Mugoša for abuse of position and accepting bribes. Charges will also be filed against the owner of the Carine company, Čedomir Popović, on suspicion of having committed the crime of bribery.
This is the third set of criminal charges filed by MANS against Mugoša in relation to illegal sales of municipal lands to the Podgorica-based Carine company. The first set of criminal charges filed by MANS were thrown out of court since it was found that “there were no elements of a criminal act,” while the second set of charges filed are still waiting to be processed by the Supreme State Prosecutor Ranka Čarapić (after the High Court of Montenegro confirmed our allegations that the agreements were illegal).
As is already known, following the ruling of the High Court, the Carine company returned 15,000 m2 of land to the city, while the Municipality of Podgorica should have paid the company €2.5-million. As it turns out, the Municipality decided to pay this debt by granting Čedomir Popović’s new request for the completion of building lots, which was initially used as an excuse to ensure that Carine would acquire valuable properties outside of a formal tender process.
The controversial “Decision for the Transfer of Lands” granted to Carine by Mugoša was adopted by calling on the Law on State Property, particularly Article 29, which states that the property of the Municipality is managed by the responsible institution. According to the Law on Local Self-Government and the Statute of the Capital City, the property of the Municipality is to be managed by the Municipal Assembly of the Capital, which means that Mugoša did not have a legal basis for concluding such an agreement.
Additionally, the Law on Local Self-Government does not allow for the alienation of local lands if such an eventuality wasn’t specified in the existing planning documentation and in the Decision on the Management of Local Building Lots. Such a decision in 2011, when Mugoša again sold the relevant lots to Carine, did not contain such a provision for the parcels affected by the deal. This constitutes yet another violation of the law for which the Mayor needs to be held accountable.
In light of the fact that the whole scenario is repeating itself, it is obvious that Mugoša isn’t legally challenged or ignorant, but that behind the whole affair stand enormous interests related to profit. It remains unknown how Čedomir Popović managed to motivate Miomir Mugoša to again violate the law and agree to a job that it was already established is legally void. However, it is certain that Mugoša wasn’t thinking of the public interest when he struck yet another deal with Carine.
For these reasons, MANS will also file criminal charges against Čedomir Popović, since in addition to financial benefits he had more than enough motivation to influence Mayor Mugoša to again break the law.
MANS has for a long time been warning the relevant institutions that the Mayor of Podgorica isn’t capable of legally disposing of key resources in the capital city (including with its available building lots). One of the measures that was supposed to curtail Mugoša’s powers over municipal property was the decision to verify these agreements in the Municipal Assembly. Unfortunately, we’re again witness to the fact that laws and regulations don’t mean much when it comes to the interests of people linked to Mugoša.
Mugoša should have also been restrained by institutions responsible for the fight against corruption and organized crime, and they should have done so preemptively before he violated other laws. This case demonstrates that something of this nature was necessary, since there is absolutely no reason to believe that his legal rehabilitation is possible. If the Prosecutor’s Office and the police were doing their job property, the only lot that Mugoša would be managing at the moment would be within the perimeter of the Spuž prison.
We wish to believe that in addition to such obvious proof of legal violations, with damage measured in the millions of euros, the ultimate reach of the courts and police will no longer be limited to lowly municipal officials and traffic cops who earn a few hundred euros in bribes. MANS calls on the Special State Prosecutor to immediately inform the public with the current status of the investigation into charges we filed nearly two years ago, and to immediately begin investigation the new violations we’ve reported Mugoša for.
