In yesterday’s press statement of the Minister of Sustainable Development and Tourism Pavle Radulovic with regard to the new law on planning and development, made after the government session, the Minister managed to deny himself and assert what MANS has already warned about – that the law is made far from the public eye and that there has been no proper public discussion organized.
We remind that the Minister Radulovic held a press conference on 10 April, where he presented the draft law on planning and development, stressing that it was a text that had already gone through the public discussion in 2015, but the work on it was “extended due a large number of suggestions for improving the draft law submitted during and after the public discussion and round tables.
Today, ten days later, Minister Radulovic said at the government session that the draft law had not yet been determined, that it would be done in the “next few days” and then sent for the public discussion.
If the law does not yet exist in the draft form, then what does the document DRAFT LAW, which can be found on the Ministry’s website and that was presented at the round table in the Chamber of Economy, which was closed to the public, represent?
So, in only two weeks, Minister Radulovic presented the draft, then denied that it existed, announced a new draft and a public discussion and organized a round table where experts discussed the proposal that does not even exist, if we are to believe the Minister.
At the same time, there is a document entitled “List of laws and policy documents for which the Ministry will organize public discussions in 2017” on the website of the Ministry. It is interesting that the Law on Planning and Development is not on the list, which indicates the intention of Minister Radulovic to “push” the law with a minimum public participation.
We are very concerned, not only because the Minister continuously and outrageously keeps deceiving the public, as it is a common practice for the function that he performs, but primarily due to the fact that legal provisions which already lack a foothold in the public interest are still being insisting on.
MANS is expecting that an issue as important as spatial development would undergo a serious discussion, devoid of deceptions and confusion of the public, and above all devoid of awareness that one’s private interests can ever come before the public ones.
Dejan Milovac
Investigation Center Director MANS
