The latest decision of the Agency for the protection of personal data in connection with access to identification numbers additionally confirms suspicions that the deletion of identification numbers from publicly available registers was intended only to slow down the detection of concrete cases of corruption and links between public officials and members of organized crime.
Specifically, in one of the concrete cases the Agency ordered to the Tax Administration of Montenegro to deliver to MANS the data about the identification numbers of persons and companies, even though it ordered only months ago a total ban for the general public access to identification numbers.
MANS is at the end of September of this year, after the Tax Administration removed the identification numbers from its site, requested information about the companies which are owned by Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, then Branimir Micunovic from Niksic, and fugitive drug boss Darko Saric. This request MANS sent based on the Law on free access to information because it was impossible to obtain them using some other mean after deletion of the data from the website of the Tax Administration. After that, the Tax Administration allowed us access to some information, but denied us the most important one –information on identification numbers.
MANS at the same time requested information about the company Univerzitats with whom Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic has ownership link, the Lottery of Montenegro, and MC Marina Budva, and Branislav Micunovic from Niksic, as well data on Mat company and Trans Trim linked with drug boss Darko Saric.
On this solution by the Tax Administration MANS appealed to the Agency for the Protection of Personal Data which is the competent authority for the implementation of the Law on Free access to information. When deciding on the appeal by MANS, the Agency found it relevant, and directed the Tax Administration to provide us with the requested identification numbers.
As a reminder, the same Agency earlier this year ordered the Tax Administration and Real Estate Administration that from their publicly available registers of companies and property remove identification numbers which makes meaningless the existence of these registers, and significantly affects business transparency and security, and real estate transaction.
The latest decision of the Agency, which in this case allows access to identification numbers, shows that the deletion of identification numbers from Administration websites had a purpose to slow down the investigations in specific cases of corruption and organized crime, and to overload them with legal procedures in which we have to prove to the Tax and Real Estate Administration what is the public interest and the right of citizens to know how many and what kind of companies has the Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, whether he has and what kind of connections he established with Branislav Micunovic and drug boss Darko Saric.
What is really important is that the Agency for the Protection of Personal Data with this decision admitted what MANS for months repeated requesting identification numbers to be returned and that is “impossible without denied information to determine the identity of persons that are on the top of the concrete companies”. This means that the public can not completely believe in information that are at this time on the websites of the Tax and Real Estate Administration, which clearly undermined their purpose which suppose to provide legal certainty and the ability of any person to know and rely on the information from the public register.
MANS through the Parliamentary Committee on Anti-Corruption initiated special consultative hearing of the Minister of Finance, Director of the Tax Administration, Director of the Agency for the Protection of Personal Data and the free access to information, regarding identification numbers, which will be held on Friday, December 27th.
This way MANS, once again, calls the Tax and Real Estate Administration to return as soon as possible identification numbers in their publicly available registers on the Internet because there is no legal basis nor it is in the interest of the public to hide them from the citizens of Montenegro.
MANS
