Famous entertainment manager Radomir Raka Marić will apparently lose the 700 thousand euros he loaned to the Municipality of Budva 17 years ago, after the Higher Court in Podgorica rejected his appeal and upheld the verdict of the Basic Court in Kotor.
The spokesperson for the Basic Court in Kotor, Judge Veljko Bulatović, confirmed to "Vijesti" that the Higher Court upheld the verdict of the Kotor court, which was handed down two years ago by Judge Sandra Đurišić.
Marić sued the Municipality of Budva and the Montenegrin Commercial Bank (CKB), demanding that the tourism metropolis pay him 700.000 euros in debt, which he had paid into the bank's account in 2008 to settle a loan obligation between the tourism metropolis and a Budva resident. Marić claimed that he borrowed the money based on a personal acquaintance with the then mayor of the municipality, the late Rajko Kuljača.
If the verdict had been in Marić's favor, the amount that the Municipality of Budva would have had to repay, with default interest, would have been at least twice as much.
"The appeal is rejected as unfounded and the verdict of the Basic Court in Kotor of May 5, 2023 is confirmed," reads the verdict of the Higher Court, which "Vijesti" had access to.
The reasoning of the verdict states that the Basic Court's verdict rejected as unfounded Marić's request, in which he requested that the Municipality of Budva be obliged to pay him the amount of 633.386,78 euros, with statutory interest starting from September 19, 2016, and that CKB pay him 66.613,22 euros with statutory interest.
The same verdict also rejected the bank's objection that the court lacked jurisdiction, but the verdict obliged Marić to pay the bank 7.986 euros in procedural costs.
Marić sued the Municipality of Budva and CKB and demanded that they return the money he allegedly used to settle the tourism metropolis's loan debt to that bank. According to the case files that "Vijesti" had access to, in April 2008 he paid 700.000 euros to CKB, which were then redirected so that 633.386,78 euros went to settle the Municipality's loan, while 66.613,22 euros were used to close the loan of a certain DD
It is also illogical that the Municipality of Budva, which is a legal entity, borrows money from individuals without any written evidence of this - a loan agreement, and that, given the amount of the loan, there is no consent for these actions... from the Municipal Assembly.
It all started on October 31, 2007, when a loan agreement was concluded between CKB and the Main Treasury Account of the Municipality of Budva, in the amount of 2.876.560,70 euros.
Interestingly, this money was redirected to close a loan for a certain company, “Lark Business SA,” which is not registered in Montenegro, but in Bijeljina. The company's headquarters are in Uruguay.
The municipality maintained during the court process that there is no financial trace in the statements of the Secretariat for Finance about the 700.000 euros that Marić allegedly paid for their account.
As stated in the explanation of the Higher Court's verdict, 2.8 million euros from the loan agreement concluded between the bank and the Municipality of Budva were not paid into the account of the local government, but into the account of the company "Lark Business SA", for which, as stated, "there is no evidence on the basis of which it would be determined what kind of obligation-legal relationship it had with the Municipality of Budva or the bank".
"There is no evidence on the basis of which it would be possible to determine why the aforementioned funds were paid to the aforementioned company. And according to the High Court's ruling, since the loan agreement was not implemented towards the Municipality of Budva, because the money was not paid to it, the plaintiff's (Marić) claim that he closed the loan of the Municipality of Budva with the funds he paid cannot be accepted, because the loan was implemented towards the company Lark Business SA," the High Court's ruling states.
The court also relied on logic
They also state that "it is not logical for a person to make a payment of a large amount of money, measured in hundreds of thousands of euros, for a loan to the Municipality of Budva and acquaintances with its representatives, without having a loan agreement concluded for that payment."
"It is also illogical that the Municipality of Budva, which is a legal entity, borrows money from individuals without any written evidence of this - a loan agreement, and that for these actions, given the amount of the loan, it does not have the consent of its own bodies, the Municipal Assembly, in accordance with the Law on Local Self-Government," the verdict states.
The Higher Court states that the Basic Court in Kotor correctly assessed as unfounded Marić's statement that he "lent the aforementioned funds to the Municipality of Budva due to his acquaintance with the then Mayor of the Municipality, Rajko Kuljač, with the aim of offsetting utility bills for the complex he was supposed to build."
"It is not logical that Marić, who claims that he only gave the bank written orders for transactions that he personally signed, allegedly pays the amount of 700.000 euros to the Municipality of Budva only on the basis of acquaintance and good relations with the Mayor of the Municipality and without a single written evidence, loan agreement, utility contract...", states the verdict of the Podgorica Higher Court.
Back in 2019, the Special State Prosecutor's Office investigated how a famous entertainment manager paid 700.000 euros to CKB to settle part of the loan of the Municipality of Budva and why the local government borrowed 2.800.000 euros from the same bank to close the loan of an unknown company "Lark Business" from Uruguay. The documentation was forwarded to the prosecution, which was then headed by the now detained Milivoje Katnić, by colleagues from the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Kotor. However, no indictment was ever filed in this case, nor was it clarified who was behind the Uruguayan company, which received a million-dollar loan.
Marić was a key figure at a time when Budva was the center of musical events in the Balkans - as a manager, he mediated the Rolling Stones' guest appearance at Jaz in 2007, and the Queen of Pop Madonna's a year later.
Those musical spectacles, which cost the Municipality of Budva more than 10 million euros, were prosecuted before the Special Prosecutor's Office.
The Organizing Committee for the Rolling Stones concert was headed by Svetozar Marović, the convicted and fugitive head of the Budva crime group, for whom a warrant was issued...
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