Former Police Director Veselin Veljovic of the company “Normal Company” bought a luxury three bedroom apartment, paying only a third of its value, after he previously with the owner of the company Zarko Buric concluded a detrimental contract to purchase the camp-hotel “Zlatica” when the state budget damaged for multimillion amount. This show the official data that analyzed the Research Center of MANS.
Veselin Veljovic the apartment at the building of Buric first time reported to the Commission for Preventing Conflicts of Interest in the report for the year 2012, when it states that he became the owner of 135 m2 of living space. Until then, under his name is registered the apartment of 92m2, which is after the divorce, as a deed of gift went to his ex-wife, Nadi Veljovic.
It is interesting that a new apartment in the Cadastre is registered to Veljovic only in June this year, three years after he for the first time officially reported it to the Commission as his property. The question is why for all this time Veljovic from the Commission and the public hid the location of his new apartment, when the apartment was paid to the seller and the fact that the apartment was purchased from the company of Zarko Buric.
In a notarized contract of purchase obtained by the Research Center of MANS it is stated that for an apartment of 135 m2 and garage space of 11m2, Veljovic paid 107,672.00 euros, and that this amount was fully paid prior to the conclusion of that contract, without specifying exactly when this happened.
Luxury three bedroom apartment is located in a new building of “Normal Company” at the intersection of Boulevard St. Peter of Cetinje and Boulevard of George Washington in Podgorica. The building in which Veljovic bought an apartment is considered to be one of the most exclusive locations in Podgorica when it comes to the price of housing and office space, and in the building beside to the headquarter of “Normal Company”, are located and the Administrative Court of Montenegro, Investment Development Fund, offices of Montenegro Airlines, and some of the elite cafes in the city. This is confirmed by the ads for the sale of apartments in the building where the apartment of identical sizes, as well as Veljovic’s, is offered for around 300,000 euros, or about 2,200 euros per square meter.
Therefore, it is more than unusual price at which Veljovic “purchased” the apartment with Zarko Buric, the owner of the company with which he is already connected through disputable ties. Namely, when is subtracted the value of the garage space which at this location is around 15,000 euros, it turns out that Veljovic for the apartment of 135 m2 paid about 92,000 euros, or about 680 Euro / m2, which is far below the market price for any part of Podgorica.
Additional confirmation that the Veljovic his three-room apartment bought at “below cost”, show the figures how much Veljovic’s first neighbors paid identical apartments in the building.
The Research Center of MANS analyzed the sales contracts of apartments located in the same entrance where Veljovic’s apartment is, and correspond in size to his property. So Veljovic’s neighbor located directly above his apartment on the fifth floor, his apartment of 137 m2 in 2010 paid 305,000 euros. His neighbor on the sixth floor apartment of 138m2 in 2011 paid 223,600 Euros, which is still more than double the price that Veljovic paid for his luxury apartment on the fourth floor.
From the company “Normal company” no one answered an email with questions about the price of a square meter in their building on the Boulevard Saint Peter of Cetinje.
Before buying an apartment, the former Police Chief in a special report, notified the Commission for the Prevention of Conflict of Interest that in 2011 sold a land of 2,204 square meters in Doljani, Podgorica, for 107,996 euros, which is the amount that corresponds to the amount he gave to the company of Zarko Buric for the aforementioned apartment. However, still is not known what the motive Zarko Buric had to sell luxury two bedroom apartment for one-third of its value, to beck then chief of the Montenegrin police, and whether the difference is price is compensated in some other way.
This was not the first suspicious financial transactions involving Veljovic and Buric. The purchase of luxury apartment in Buric’s building was preceded by the job between the Police and “Normal Company” while Veljovic still was in charge of the police.
The Government of Montenegro in 2006, when Veljovic became the head of the Police, sold a majority package of shares of UTIP “Montenegro”, in which they were camp and hotel “Zlatica” and hotels “Ljubovic” and “Montenegro” for 4.760.000 euros to Buric’s “Normal company”. Police, led by Veljovic, in 2011 for the SAJ needs again bought from Buric camp “Zlatica” for as much as 8.3 million euros, which enabled Buric to illegally, just from the sale of one of the hotels to make a huge profit.
On this occasion MANS in 2013. Filed criminal charges to the Montenegrin Prosecutor’s Office against several persons, including Veljovic and Buric, and that case is currently is under the scrutiny of the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Corruption and Organized Crime.
In addition to this work, for the former first police officer are bound and other doubts in legality of his work. Veljovic during this year, as citizens, was questioned in connection with the allocation of housing and housing loans of the Police Union. Apartments in the building at Tuski put in Podgorica were allegedly allocated to his closed associates, or officials at the management positions in the Police. According to the prosecution, and the case is in the pre-trial investigation.
This text is made with the support of the European Union within the project “Zero tolerance to corruption”. The contents of this article is the sole responsibility of the Network for Affirmation of Non-governmental Sector – MANS, and opinions contained herein shall not in any case be considered positions of the European Union.
Still with no adequate sanctions for illicit enrichment of Montenegrin officials
The Ministry of Justice should submit to parliamentary committees for anti-corruption and political system a model for efficiently combating and sanctioning illegal enrichment of officials.
That is stated in paragraphs of two committees submitted to the Parliament, after consultation hearing on the introduction of a new criminal offense of illicit enrichment by public officials, held on May 15th. The initiative to criminalize acts of illicit enrichment MANS filed earlier this year, after the European Commission’s (EC) in the Progress Report on Montenegro for 2014 emphasized that as the need to address this problem.
“The Ministry of Justice should, in accordance with paragraphs from the European Commission Progress Report on Montenegro for 2014 to propose and to submit to the committees by the end of September a model that believes it will provide the most effective suppression and sanctioning of illicit enrichment of public officials”, it is stated in the paragraphs of the Board.
Brazilian flooring, German sanitary ware, travertine marble …
On the website of “Normal Company” the building where Veljovic owns an apartment, is described as “one of the most attractive and most luxurious buildings in the city.” This company stated that the apartments “have luxury equipment including Brazilian flooring, Villeroy & Boch sanitary equipment, Daikin air-conditioning system, Italian doors Nusco Porte, and that the floors and walls in the apartments are covered with travertine marble”.
