In the upcoming elections, it will be decided whether we want to be a province of Greater Serbia or whether we will continue on the path we have started - to upgrade and further develop and improve our country as an organized European country, as our state house, said the presidential candidate and leader of the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) Milo Đukanović.
"At any time, the state needs serious people at the head of the state, especially when such geopolitical disturbances occur, which are only added to the inherited historical problems, starting with the division of Montenegrin society and lagging behind in development," said Đukanović from the forum in Sutomore.
"Montenegro needs serious and responsible people at its head. Let's try to get such an election result in the presidential and parliamentary elections", he added.
He said that he never "radiated illusions" and that he never "shared unrealistic optimism". "What I am telling you is completely realistic for me. I am convinced that I will win the elections on April 2. Victory in the presidential elections completely opens the way for us to win the parliamentary elections. I hope I don't have to convince you of that. So, for sure 50 percent of the work for the parliamentary elections ends on April 2," said the DPS president.
Đukanović, as announced by that party, in the continuation of the forum and the "interactive dialogue with mixed people", referred to his opponents, as well as to the course of the campaign so far.
"The campaign has so far shown that the majority of all my opponents are actually playing for the same national team. They are just different versions of Greater Serbian politics in Montenegro. That's Mandić, you certainly don't need to waste words on that, he declares himself that way. This is Danilović, who spent his whole life with him in the same business. Bečić, who wrote the largest part of his political biography as an SNP supporter, for whom we know the position he held at the time of the referendum, and the position he held all this time. And now, as we can see, it is definitely Milatović. This engagement that you see from Belgrade, now on the eve of the second round, convincingly confirms that. From the recommendation of Vojislav Šešelj, to the organization of Montenegrins in Belgrade, the same ones who offered to decide for us on May 21, 2006 whether Montenegro will be independent", said Đukanović.
"We have a platform opposed to us that is both ideologically and politically perfectly clear. Therefore, each of them will have full support for the further destruction of Montenegro, because the idea is that Montenegro should be reorganized - above all, economically and institutionally. That the institutions should be paralyzed, that the economy should be brought to its knees, that Montenegro should be so indebted that it can no longer finance its functions, so that then of course there would be a savior who would say - well, we have been telling you since the time before the referendum that you independence is not needed, so now you need to get on your knees in the position of the twenty-seventh electoral unit that we offered you in 2006", added Đukanović, saying that this is exactly the idea of all four of his opponents.
Đukanović assessed that in these elections it will be decided "whether we want to be a province of Greater Serbia or whether we will continue on the path we have taken", to "upgrade and further develop and improve our country as an organized European country, as our state house".
"I read how Milatović is going to bring Montenegro into the EU?! So, have we seen the performance of the government in which he worked in 2021?! Not only is Montenegro stopped on its way to the EU, but today a huge chasm has been dug between Montenegro and the European Union, which should be the grave of an independent, civil, European Montenegro. Is what he is recommended to us good enough for the election", asked Đukanović.
He said that he respects "everyone who can stand up and say I was a good pupil, I was a good student". "I really respect that. But we are now on a different field where fives or tens are not enough for us, we are now on the field where we are showing whether we are able to implement what we have studied and learned for the benefit of the state and the people. to brag to us? Is it his government that refused vaccines for political reasons during the time of the coronavirus when there was no vaccination in Montenegro, when people were dying and when Montenegro was at the top of all countries in the world, it seems to me in third-fourth place in terms of death to population ratio. Is it? Or is it his ability to gather investors and bring them in. Can we all collectively think of one investor who came in recently? Of course we will remember those who are gone. Not to mention the shameful attitude related to the ten Montenegrins on the Belvedere, who if they died - they died. So what does that have to do with the holy goal of the apostolic government of Zdravko Krivokapić?! Those are the references of the candidates who is now recommended to us as a savior. I don't think we need to spend any more words," said Đukanović.
According to the party, the DPS leader also spoke about his past work and the period from 2006 to 2020, "in which salaries and pensions in Montenegro were doubled."
"Of course, you always have those who think they could have been quadrupled?! But, unlike the sowers of illusions, we tried to offer a realistic policy, to first create the conditions for investments to develop here. And they developed. And the highway, and the submarine cable, and Portonovi, and Porto Montenegro, and winter ski centers, and not to mention more... Investments worth several billions have been developed. Also, we tried to get as many people from Montenegro as possible to enter the business, because it is not in our interest that only foreigners do business here. We need them for various reasons and for the capital we need for very expensive projects and for the transfer of experience. We now have to build some very demanding facilities that no one from Montenegro has ever built, so we will overcome it more successfully if we do it in co-production with foreign investors who have serious references in the realization of these projects. But I repeat, our goal is not to have only foreigners here, our goal is to start the business potential of Montenegro, to start the entrepreneurial culture of Montenegro. So we worked very hard to get new companies to form. I looked at the data from 2006 to the end of 2019 - 20.000 new companies were created in Montenegro! Not on paper - 20.000 active companies", announced Đukanović.
The president of DPS said that during that time "very intensive work was done", and that "in the final, Montenegro became what it has never been in history - the most developed country in our region".
"Today, by all parameters, Montenegro is the most developed country in the Western Balkans, and for a long time the most dynamic economy in Southeast Europe. The difference is that when I talk about it, then we add some other countries like Bulgaria, Romania, etc... So, in that period, the largest investments were made here, the largest number of jobs were created, the largest number of people were employed," he said. Djukanovic.
He said that he agreed that "it is always possible to complain - could it have been done faster, could it have been possible to build the highway more slowly and invest more in salaries..."
"It is best if you invest in what is the most difficult and the most expensive - infrastructure. Without infrastructure you have no private equity interest. When you develop infrastructure, private capital comes, when private capital comes, jobs come and then you have the opportunity to increase wages."
"I think there are more than enough very obvious reasons for which every person would have to conclude that this way of managing the economy and the country for two and a half years is leading this country to bankruptcy," said the president of DPS, referring to the current situation in Montenegro Burning.
"The last debt they provided to the state is at an interest rate of almost 10 percent. Let's simplify things to the end. Each of us here in the hall today, if we go to the bank and ask for a loan, we will get it at a cheaper interest rate than the interest rate that the state got. What it means? Therefore, states and governments are always the most grateful partner to banks. When I led the government, the banks pushed us money because they take money from depositors, put it in their accounts, pay passive interest rates to those who gave them money, they want to place it somewhere... It is logical that they first of all want to place it with those for whom they know will return it to them. The state is therefore the most reliable debtor. And because of that, the state is given a lower interest rate than the citizens," Đukanović pointed out.
He says that today the state is in a situation where it pays "a drastically higher interest rate than the citizens, because it is not trusted, because the creditors see that there is no household management of the country".
"They see that this country is collapsing, that they didn't come from the government to ask for a loan for the second section of the highway for which they would have received it, because when you finished the first one and when the cars travel and pay the road tax and repay the loan, you have no problem getting a loan for second share. Rather, they see that the government is coming to borrow money for salaries, and it is not being paid back. So paying an interest rate of 10 percent is not the worst that can happen to us, the worst is what follows: that you cannot get into debt. Because there is no bank that will give a loan to a desperate person when they see that the desperate person will accept whatever interest rate you want. The one who accepts whatever interest rate you want means that he has no intention of repaying that loan. And no one gives money to such a person. And when the money runs out, there are no salaries, no pensions," says the DPS president.
He points out that, based on all of the above, "for reasonable people" it is the last moment "to wake up from sleep, in order to stop this agony".
"I'm not talking about bankruptcy in 2024 or 2025. I'm talking about bankruptcy in 2023! And here we know each other quite well, I've been here for thirty years and I've never dramatized more than I should. On the contrary, he always reassured me until I could shoulder the responsibility of realizing what I was talking about. Today I am talking about it, but others are implementing it, those who are not doing it in the interest of Montenegro. The smallest problem is that they would like to do the opposite of what I am saying, time will put everything in its place and I do not have any burdens in relation to those people, but the problem is that when we wake up in Montenegro it will be too late. If we do not come to our senses when the first salaries and pensions are not distributed, and I repeat to you in 2023, then it is too late. Then we already have a revolution in the street. What do you expect from a pensioner who did not receive a pension, how to live?" concludes Đukanović.
He also said that "we all have to think seriously about this topic when we decide who we trust".
"I don't sow illusions, I don't manipulate people, I tell you what you don't like like a while ago. So we are certainly moving forward, but we are moving forward from realistic sources, sustainably. We create a social product, we develop business, we attract investors, not drive them away, we create jobs and from there salaries and pensions go up, not like this", concluded Đukanović.
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