The Government of Montenegro today, after MANS filed a complaint to the previous list of candidates, established a new list of members of the future Operational team for drafting the action plan and the implementation of the measures from the action plan in accordance with the principles of Open Government Partnership, and to our organization enabled to, in accordance with the law, participate in the work of the Operational team.
In fact, in the previously published list of candidates for membership in the Operational team, which the Government established two days ago, registration of MANS was ignored for reasons unknown to us, while we have the best references and our application was submitted in accordance with the law, secondary legislation and by Invitation for the nomination of candidates in that working body. That is why we have appealed and requested from the Government to amend the list in accordance with the law and regulations, because otherwise we will be forced to initiate an administrative dispute. The Government still decided to comply with the Montenegrin positive regulations, and today announced a revised list of candidates including MANS as well.
It is interesting that on the updated list of candidates is also a representative of the Lottery organization in Montenegro (UPIS), which was also initially rejected, and its own candidate registered for the area of “increasing liability of the company”, although it is totally unclear how this so-called non-governmental organization could pass control of the Government and how could demonstrated experience in this field. The UPIS is publicly recognized as an organization that works under direct orders from Branislav Micunovic and Sava Grbovic – Dzigi, and which has so far organized public persecution of all of those who demanded in Montenegro better results in the fight against organized crime and initiated proceedings to determine legality of activities from the criminal milieu, including Micunovic and Grbovic.
Therefore, one of the first tasks of MANS within the Operational team will be to determine how is possible that in the Operational team is included emissary of Branislav Micunovic and Sava Grbovic, and to enable to those people to deal with, among other things, supervision over the implementation of reforms in the field of organized crime, and they alone should be the subject of the work of the Supreme state Prosecutor’s Office. Therefore, we will request from the Government complete documentation submitted by the UPIS, and the Government’s reports stating that the UPIS meets the criteria for membership in the Operational team, and we will seek that such a decision is revised, in order to prevent an absurd situation that representatives of interesting people can to participate in the creation of official anti-corruption policies.
Also, within the Operational team we will closely monitor the respect of procedures, including and the Rules of Procedure, which was adopted on the initiative of MANS tin order to ensure that this body starts to give results and to ensure that the reforms envisaged by the action plan for Open Government Partnership are fully and in the manner prescribed by the action plan itself.
As a reminder, Open Government Partnership is a global initiative that Montenegro joined in early 2012 and which aims to improve the transparency of the work of all branches of the Government, and establishment of the rule of law at all levels, including and a stronger fight against political corruption, which should be done with a greater cooperation of state bodies and civil sector. Unfortunately, the initial enthusiasm of the Government when it comes to this initiative has been lost suddenly , as soon as the executive branch got aware that it is necessary to provide concrete results, and in two and a half years of participating in this initiative Montenegro unfortunately does not give too much praise.
In order to finally improve results in this area, the Government of Montenegro for the new coordinator of the Operational team recently appointed Srdjan Kusovac, whose main task is to manage the Operational team and to ensure full coordination of state authorities and NGOs in order of better implementation of reforms. So to Kusovac, longtime editor of Pobjeda, entrusted a close cooperation with NGOs in Montenegro, although it is known that this is a person who organized using the state’s Pobjeda continuous persecution of all NGOs in Montenegro who dared to criticize work of the Government in any field. So Kusovac, using the dirtiest lies and manipulations, day after day tried to discredit critical NGOs, bringing state’s Pobjeda to the lowest level since its establishment.
It is the nomination of Kusovac as the head of the Operational team the biggest reason for our doubts in the intentions of the Government to ensure the efficient functioning of the Operational team and to provide a minimum results in the global initiative of the Open Government Partnership. Indeed, MANS will as before propose concrete measures and recommendations in order to improve results in the fight against corruption and organized crime, and to increase the transparency of state bodies, and through the Government’s attitude towards those proposals in the Operational team will soon be crystallized real will of the Government to finally comes to concrete, much needed reforms.
MANS
