Today, MANS filed a criminal charges with the competent Basic State Prosecutor’s Office in Kotor against Ratko Mitrović, Minister of Ecology, Spatial Planning and Urbanism, and his son – Matija Mitrović, on suspicion of committing the crime of Building a facility without reporting and construction documentation.
The data obtained by MANS show that the family of Minister Mitrović performed works on the facility in Budva in the period after 2008, which entails criminal liability in accordance with the amendments to the Criminal Code of Montenegro, which define illegal construction as a separate criminal offense. The information MANS obtained also shows that Mitrović family continued the works on the facility even after submitting the request for legalization.
In December 2017, Minister Ratko Mitrović and his wife gave their son Matija Mitrović two plots in the Budva settlement of Komoševina as a gift, with a total area of about 550 m2.
The estimated value of the plots that were transferred to the younger Mitrović free of charge was 15,000 euros. However, although a facility was built on the donated plots at that time, it is not mentioned in the Deed of Gift.
As early as the following year, Matija Mitrović submitted a request to the Budva Secretariat for legalization of the mentioned building, stating that it is a completely finished and inhabited building, consisting of a basement + ground floor and a total gross area of 195m2.
However, footage from the Geoportal shows a significantly larger building on the ground whose base of only one floor is close to 200m2, and that the building has two floors more than what the son of the Minister of Urbanism reported.
As it is already known, in its request, the Budva Secretariat for Urbanism called on Mitrović to eliminate the irregularities, and after the corrections were not made, the request was officially rejected in January this year.
However, the comparison of the situation on the ground from 2018 and today shows that Mitrović family continued with performing of works on the facility, without waiting for an answer on the outcome of the legalization procedure. This was confirmed by Minister Mitrović in his public address, stating even that he was the one who helped his son financially in order for the facility to be completed.
Data from the field show that after the house, another solid construction facility, close to 50m2, was built on Mitrović’s plots, which was not registered for legalization.
Data from the Municipality of Budva show that the planning document “Komoševina 1” was adopted in 2011, which left enough time for the current Minister of Urbanism to apply for a building permit in the legal procedure, instead of persistently continuing to build contrary to the law.
All of the above points to the conclusion that the current Minister of Urbanism has for years knowingly violated the laws and regulations governing the field of spatial planning, and that in addition to misdemeanour, due to illegal construction, there are grounds for his criminal prosecution. It is particularly worrying that the Minister actively encouraged his family members to commit the criminal offense, but also that after becoming the head of the institution that deals with the protection of space, he did not declare an obvious conflict of interest when it comes to future actions regarding his son’s facility.
Therefore, MANS also submitted a request to his ministry today to initiate an inspection procedure regarding the facility of Matija Mitrović, and to establish all the facts related to that facility. Starting from how it was possible that all these years, this illegal facility was not the subject of inspection attention, until the final determination of the dynamics of construction and the exact areas.
We agree with Minister Mitrović that his son’s illegal facility is only one of thousands on Montenegrin coastline, but we also remind him of the promises to break with the practice of selective acting in the application of the law and that there will no longer be the “untouchables”.
That is why we believe that it would be good to show on the example of illegal construction of the Minister of Urbanism whether the legal system works, or the old practice established by DPS ministers in this department has been continued.
Thus, we call on the authorities in this ministry to fully exercise their powers in the case of the illegal house of the son of the Minister of Urbanism, and for the Minister himself to enable them to do so with his behaviour.
On the other hand, MANS expects the competent State Prosecutor’s Office to open an investigation into this case as soon as possible, and we call on them to establish all the facts about the work that already greatly compromises Minister Mitrović’s capacity to be taken seriously by the public as a reformer, and not just as someone who has taken over the practice of putting personal interests ahead of respect for laws and regulations from the previous regime.
Dejan Milovac
MANS
