INTERVIEW Abdić: The stories that we are unwanted no longer hold water

For many, anti-DPS (Democratic Party of Socialists) is the only program, but stories about DPS as an undesirable partner no longer hold water.

This is what the leader of the list of that party told "Vijesti" ("In word and deed") at the upcoming elections in Podgorica, Nermin Abdić.

He said in an email interview that DPS will win the largest number of votes in the elections scheduled for September 29, and that without them it will not be possible to form a government.

Among other things, Abdić said that if DPS comes to power, it will not oppose the development of the city, but will demand that it be developed according to the needs of the population.

"The first step towards that is the initiation of changes to the Law on Spatial Planning and Building Construction and giving greater autonomy to local self-governments..." he stated.

What, specifically, percentage of support do you expect and why do you think citizens will vote for your list?

Citizens will vote for our list because they want security. Despite the numerous challenges they faced, the mayors who were elected from the ranks of the DPS in the previous period showed that our city can be orderly and organized, and the benefits of the dedicated work of those city administrations were felt by every resident of Podgorica. This is because my predecessors were equally devoted to all parts of the city and to all our fellow citizens.

We fulfilled our promises, worked humanely and honestly, and this is what we can promise even now - people in key positions in the city will not be elected based on party achievements, but based on what they had to show in the profession they come from. In this way, I am convinced that the results cannot be missed and that the citizens will once again witness the realization of pre-election promises in a hundred percent amount. I can say with certainty that DPS will win the largest number of votes, and that the support for our policy will be so great that without us it will not be possible to form a government in Podgorica.

What, in your opinion, are the key problems of Podgorica?

The key problem at the moment is the incompetent current government. From this problem arises a whole series of others and, in the end, the complete dysfunctionality of the system. The previous two years have shown that the people who were given the most responsible positions in the local self-government system do not know the problems of our city, nor do they have a plan to solve them. Moreover, they showed that they see Podgorica exclusively as political prey. The result is a general communal and infrastructural chaos that will await the new city administration. And that is the problem of all of us. Overcrowded containers, lack of care for the water and sewage infrastructure, dry fountains and dug-up roads, traffic chaos and general dissatisfaction of citizens. Less than two years after taking over the government, we were talking about garbage and rats in Podgorica, water shortages and the scorched pitch of the City Stadium.

I said it and I'll say it again - if the development of Podgorica had not been stopped less than two years ago, our fellow citizens would have welcomed the next local elections with an organized infrastructure, a built pedestrian bridge over Ribnica, reconstructed squares of Božana Vučinić, Golootočki žrtava, Bašić, with a completed promenade along Morača and a new the promenade on Ljubović, the central park on Ćemovsko polje on an area of ​​430.000 square meters, with new urban and rural roads and semi-underground garages, small and medium-sized businesses started in the old city core, multi-purpose facilities in all parts of the city where primary health care is not adequate, new social services for all categories of the population, organized public transport, organized parks and new children's playgrounds, new cultural and sports events, adequate infrastructure for wastewater treatment, a fully functional new city cemetery...

If you were part of the government, how would you solve the problem of urban disorder in the capital?

We do not shy away from the fact that Podgorica is currently one of the cities where the negative side of accelerated development is felt. We intend to do everything to establish good practices, and to minimize the damage already done to the public space. Our vision is to humanize Podgorica, to become a city that is better for the lives of its inhabitants. When we say a more humane city, it means that the infrastructure, traffic, urban planning and everyday life are directed towards the citizen and subordinated to the average person. Hence our plan to provide functional and free public transport, to create conditions for increasing the accommodation capacity in the facilities of educational institutions.

Investors must not be allowed to creatively interpret their obligations, citizens' views must not be ignored or stifled. The fact is that Podgorica is expanding, that new residential buildings are being built, and we cannot promise that this will not happen again. What we can and what we promise is that we will not allow these new buildings to mean an additional burden on the already inadequate infrastructure, health care, kindergartens, roads, parking lots, public transportation... because all this clearly leads to the collapse of people's quality of life. And once we fill the empty areas, we have not only burdened the infrastructure, but also lost the possibility to build new public facilities on them.

Therefore, we will not oppose the development of the city, but demand that it be developed according to the needs of the population. The first step towards this is the initiation of changes to the Law on Spatial Planning and Building Construction and giving greater autonomy to local governments in this area.

In the campaign, among other things, you promised free city transport for all citizens, free stay in state kindergartens for all children, solving the issue of legalization of facilities... Why did DPS not implement these initiatives while in power in Podgorica?

Previous city administrations listened to the needs of citizens and worked accordingly. I will only reflect on the last few years. If you were to ask any of our fellow citizens what Podgorica lacks, you would almost automatically get the answer - greenery, more green areas, parks, facilities of that type. In response, we received 27 new parks and sports and recreation areas, 70 children's playgrounds, hundreds of new tree rows... The next criticism would come at the expense of public transportation. Procurement of new buses and the creation of new bus lines, modernization of bus stops and the entire supporting infrastructure were started. Criticisms were directed at the traffic infrastructure, crowds, etc. 240 kilometers of roads were reconstructed or renovated and thousands of new parking spaces were created. So, it went in the direction of solving the problem.

Our promises are a logical sequence of events. After the completion of the process of modernization of public transport, and in order to attract people to use private cars as little as possible, public transport should be made free for all citizens. In addition, free transportation, just like the free preschool education service for all Podgorica children, is a product of the socio-economic moment and the contribution of the future local administration to the improvement of the household budgets of our fellow citizens, since they all felt the negative effects of the economic deception called the program "Europe now".

Although your party claims that the current city government is to blame for numerous problems in the capital, don't you think that the DPS, which managed Podgorica until just a year and a half ago, is also responsible for the current situation in some fields? The current government claims that you left them destroyed companies, a neglected system, etc., and that a year and a half is not enough to solve those problems...

I struggle to understand the outgoing city administration's attempts to justify its incompetence. However, I have to state that they are doing it in a completely wrong way. I will remind the citizens that only during the last term in which the DPS was the backbone of the authorities in Podgorica, almost 15 million euros were allocated for the purchase of new equipment for city companies and services. New trucks, tankers, spider vehicles, vehicles for the Protection Service, specialized machines for the reconstruction of road infrastructure - made the Capital City have not only the best, but also by far the most equipped services in this part of Europe. These are all public data, which can be easily verified.

Mrs (Olive) Injac and her team did not know or wanted to take advantage of the fact that the capital has by far the best personnel resources in the country, the most stable finances and the greatest development potential, party logic and the desire for revanchism prevailed. There was a political usurpation of city positions, people who did not know the job were brought in, while at the same time professionals, some with decades of experience, were brutally persecuted, which we are still witnessing today. Because of this attitude towards honest people and top professionals, because of hatred towards DPS, because of ignorance and inaction, the mandate of the current city administration, for the first time in the history of the city, ends before the regular elections.

Only in the first six months of work of the new city administration in Podgorica, as many as 252 work contracts were concluded. In some companies, people who are on the payroll have never appeared in the companies and institutions from which they receive their salary. The only recommendation for a specific position was the party booklet, so for the second year already, there are people in leadership positions whose acting status is extended because they do not meet the basic legal requirements to receive a full mandate in the position for which they were designed. All this resulted in general dissatisfaction and chaos, and the city began to be shaken by numerous scandals such as the illegal appointment of the commander of the Protection and Rescue Service, the spilling of waste water into the Morača River, the devastation of symbols of Podgorica, such as the City Stadium, and many others.

In addition, instead of the promised progress, the citizens of Podgorica received an increase in the price of water, parking, lease of business premises, lease of market stalls, increase in real estate taxes, entrance fees for swimming pools, etc.

Given that you claim that you will form a new government, have you talked with potential coalition partners, if so - with whom, and what will you do to increase the coalition potential of DPS?

I have said it many times, and now I repeat it - the "In word and deed" list is not and will not be ahead of the interests of the citizens. We strive for development, we strive for Podgorica to be an example. Whoever wants it will be our partner. We have shown our intentions through concrete examples. I remind you that it was the DPS that overthrew the government after 100 days, if we had our hands full, that government would still last.

Is there, by name, any party from the current government that is programmatically close to you and with which you would cooperate? Who are the ones you wouldn't want to be with?

Montenegro, both at the state and local level, needs a broad and strong civil front that will prevent the further collapse of institutions and all the challenges the country is facing, which arose as a product of the work of politicians after August 30, 2020. There are parties that, apart from DPS, are traditionally the backbone of civic Montenegro that fights for European values.

DPS has always chosen partners based on value. It will be the same when it comes to the elections in Podgorica. We will be a partner to those who, just like us, want a society of citizens equally for all, a society of all religions and nations, those who are ready to intensively deal with the improvement of the city, economic problems, living standards, etc. for the next four years. These are the values ​​we fight for and have never deviated from. Exclusively value-based coalitions can survive in the long term and a stable political majority can be formed on them.

Do you see the possibility of cooperation with the list supported by the head of state Jakov Milatović, which has not explicitly stated that it is against coalition with you and whose representatives claim that they should not be "scared by the DPS"?

I had the opportunity to answer this question several times during the campaign and I said, which I will repeat again - for many, anti-DPS is the only program, but stories about DPS as an undesirable partner no longer hold water.

If the prosecutor's office does not respond to "double voters", we will say what we are doing

DPS leader Danijel Živković announced the day before yesterday that your party has proof that over 3.300 people who have the right to vote in Serbia and Republika Srpska are also on the voter list for the elections in Podgorica. He said that on election day, the DPS will prevent each of those persons from exercising their right to vote, "because they have it illegally in Podgorica". How will you do it?

The DPS leadership publicly announced that there is evidence of this... It's been the second day since we announced it, and we still expect that, in the short term, that is, before the elections, the competent institutions will react adequately and conduct an investigation. We still believe in their elementary responsibility in performing their work tasks. We believe that the Higher State Prosecutor's Office, which has this jurisdiction, will conduct an express investigation as they have conducted in some other cases before. If this does not happen, we will inform the public about the mechanisms we intend to take.

Podgorica should not be run by those who do not feel it with their heart and soul

What do you think qualifies you, as a doctor, to be mayor?

Earlier, and especially in the last couple of years, we had the opportunity to make sure that vocational training does not play a decisive role in how someone runs the city, department, and country. We previously had a doctor at the head of the city, and an extremely successful one, we had a university professor who was also successful, and then in just a year and a half we saw that there are also university professors who did not manage in that role. So, to the question of what qualifies me, I will answer simply - immense love for the city where I was born, raised, educated, raised a family, and still live and work today.

Above all, I tried to be a friend to all the men and women of Podgorica, to find time and understanding for everyone who turned to me, not taking into account the working hours, but to solve everyone's problem, if it was in my power. I am convinced that this is a model of how I should work as a mayor, to be the true host that our city deserves.

The fact that I have never and will not do unprincipled things also recommends me for this position. I want to hear criticism, suggestions in every part of Podgorica. What I can say with certainty is that I experience Podgorica with a lot of love. Our city should never again be run by people who do not feel it with their heart and soul.