Twenty years of running around

Oh, how I enjoyed myself that night. A friend from the hiking group was taking bottles of Plantaže Chardonnay out of his backpack. We drank it as if we were celebrating something big that was yet to come. It was the most delicious wine I had ever drunk in my life.

We soon saw that it wouldn't be easy. Just when we thought we had taken our own country into our own hands, that we would no longer blame others for the bad situation in Montenegro, it turned out that we were our own worst enemy.

2006-2012: Betrayal of the idea of ​​a successful state

The first serious blow came with the Spatial Plan of Montenegro. With the campaign "Let's Plan, Not the Lobby" we tried to stop the document that opened the door to mass urbanization and exploitation of space. We failed. The story of a successful state began to collapse where it should have been strongest: in spatial planning. Not on the beaches, not on the rivers, but on paper.

An investment boom followed. Money came in from Russian tycoons, everyone was selling their grandfather's property. The coast began to turn into a huge construction site. Houses were springing up everywhere, including in protected areas. The system was not an obstacle. The system was a service.

At the same time, an environmental vignette for vehicles was introduced. For all cars in the country and all those entering Montenegro. The idea was to invest that money in the environment, build collectors and much more. The vignette cost from 10-150 euros, depending on the size of the vehicle. Citizens and tourists paid for it for years. Millions were collected. Almost not a single cent was returned to nature.

The new state is looking for new laws, dozens of working groups are writing regulations. It's just that we didn't write them for the common good, but for interest groups. And they were written carefully vaguely, purely to be interpreted as anyone wanted. It could be this way, or that way. They knew that strong laws were a threat to dirty investments.

The story of the dams on the Morača River begins. The government also harnessed CANU (which, let's face it, has been silent for two decades on all important issues for the state) to promote the project and present scientific falsehoods, just so that construction could take place. They failed, not because the environmentalists were strong, but because they couldn't find an investor, Norway was interested... they left because they saw who they were dealing with.

The Government of Montenegro establishes the Environmental Protection Agency. The institution is supposed to create environmental protection policies. The people employed are mostly average, obedient and humble. Numerous investments that are dangerous to the environment have been given the green light. The agency has not become what it was founded for, but has become a service for investors, a shortcut to easier permits. At the same time, after four decades, the Government is closing down the key environmental protection institution in the country: the Institute for Environmental Protection. Disobedient and fickle, the Institute was not up to the task, it was merged into the Agency and researchers were turned into civil servants. Science has been replaced by administration, professions have been transformed into bureaucracy.

2012-2020: Destruction of institutions

Companies close to the government "invest" in ecology through renewable energy sources, a little bit of water has been snatched, a little bit of wind. The national electricity company subsidizes the construction of small and wind power plants to the godfathers, we, the citizens, pay for everything. Montenegro is starting to dam up increasingly free-flowing watercourses. The damage to nature and the state budget is incalculable. The agency sponsors almost every permit.

The saltworks in Ulcinj are harvesting their last tons of salt in 2013. The plan is to turn it into Dubai, so that the rich can enter through Port Milena with their yachts... The government is building a bridge over the Bojana River, it is planned to open, who knows how many yachts there would be if an active campaign to save the saltworks had not been launched. Under pressure from Brussels, the state is giving up on construction and giving it to the management of national parks, a company that is unable to manage even natural ecosystems, let alone a completely artificial one. The bloody campaign lasted until 2019.

Montenegro opens Chapter 27, environmental protection. More due to political marketing by the Austrian Chancellor than real intentions.

It begins with the identification of areas of special interest for protection at the EU level - the Natura 2000 network. More than 300 experts worked on the project from 2016-2026. Montenegro has been mapped, the results show spectacular biodiversity.

Waste management is becoming an increasingly serious problem, illegal city landfills are opening, only Tivat and Podgorica are getting equipped with sanitary facilities. Možura opens later. In the meantime, due to the lack of inspections, thousands of small landfills are springing up.

2020-2026: False change and its continuation

After the political changes, a turnaround was expected. As a society, we experienced another defeat: a continuation followed, but the pattern remained the same.

The government is launching gas and oil exploration in the Adriatic. New ones have arrived, just like the old ones. They are only interested in profit. And if possible, pelicans, yachts, tourism, oil, all at the same time to keep everyone happy.

The Environmental Protection Agency is experiencing a revival: finally, a man is coming who judges according to the law, outside of political and tycoon influences. The fact that the director has been without four assistants for five years, although there is a systematized position for them, shows how much a strong institution does not suit the state. The functioning of the institution is best if it is beheaded…

Gravel mining on the Morača River, apart from being ecological, is also a serious economic problem: almost a billion euros of our money converted into gravel has been extracted from Donja Zeta.

Thanks to just a few people, a serious fight against poaching is starting for the first time in the Skadar Lake National Park, dozens of people are being prosecuted. Billions of fish eggs are being laid simply because the state said: enough.

The waste in Bijela has been cleaned up.

Construction and fisheries inspectors were arrested, and that's where it stopped. Dozens of them are awaiting prosecution.

The Pljevlja thermal power plant continues to poison, despite ecological reconstruction. One of the largest ecological incidents ever in Montenegro occurs - the spill of tailings from the Lead and Zinc Mine. The largest ecological incident ever caused the quietest response from the administration.

Construction of a wastewater treatment plant for Podgorica has begun, and the Minister of Urban Planning publicly asked himself in Kotor: UNESCO or construction. Then he focused on Velje Brdo and the Spatial Plan of Montenegro until 2040. It was adopted by force, without the necessary approvals.

Alabar has arrived, the Government of Montenegro is throwing itself at his feet, the Constitution and the ecological state are under threat. The rules will apply to all of us except for investors from the UAE. Montenegro has returned to the anarchy in nature protection from the dark ages of the DPS.

We should not ignore all these years of silence or selling out for cheap money the "intellectual" elite of the ecological sector. Money is important, nature survived the ice age, professors know that well, and tycoons will survive too.

It should not be forgotten that in the new government, our interests write the laws. So the new Forest Law also states that the Government decides on the highest price for a cubic meter of wood at a public auction. Not who pays more, but who pays up to the amount determined by the government.

Poaching has been reduced for two decades.

People are slowly learning to recycle.

After six years of negotiations between the Government and the municipality, the Ulcinj Saltworks has been given a chance, although there is still no manager.

Activism is awakening, a few people in the country with their influence through social networks get more work done than institutions and the civil sector combined. When you work with your heart and mind, not for money.

Montenegro continues to rush.

The government still does not want to strengthen institutions and is knowingly violating its own laws. What better example could there be than Velje Brdo?

The citizens are not entirely blameless either: everyone would like the laws to be respected, but to start with the neighbors. The reactions of the people of Boka to the filling of the sea in Baošići are a clear example of lethargy.

Twenty years after independence, the choice is still the same: to be a country that protects nature or a country that sells it. Perhaps we should turn the tables.

The greatest victories for Montenegro's nature in these two decades have not come from the system, but from the fight against it.

The author is an ornithologist