The Basic Court in Pljevlja will send a request to the Parliament today to impeach officials of the New Serbian Democracy (NSD). Milan Lekić lift parliamentary immunity, so that the criminal prosecution of that parliamentarian can continue for the accident he caused while drunk in that city last year.
"Vijesti" was told this yesterday by the Pljevlja court, stating that the request will be forwarded to parliament - by mail.
"... We inform you that the judge today (yesterday) made a request for approval to initiate criminal proceedings against the defendant, and the same (request) will be submitted to the Parliament of Montenegro," they said.
In mid-May, the Pljevlja Basic State Prosecutor's Office filed an indictment against Lekić for endangering public traffic, after he crashed the company's official vehicle in October last year, with a blood alcohol level of 1,22 per mille, as the head of the Board of Directors of the Pljevlja Coal Mine (RUP), causing extensive material damage.
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Due to the accident, the judge of the Bijelo Polje Misdemeanor Court fined Lekić 750 euros, three penalty points and imposed a protective measure of a three-month ban on driving a motor vehicle, and the NSD official subsequently resigned from his position as head of the RUP Board of Directors.
Lekić was also caught driving a company vehicle while drunk at the end of May last year. For this, he was fined 500 euros.
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The leader of the Pljevlja-based NSD returned to the parliamentary benches at the beginning of July, where he succeeded Marko Kovačević who resigned due to the incompatibility of functions, namely because he was re-elected as the first man of Nikšić.
When asked whether he would call on his government colleagues to lift his immunity to prevent obstructions like in the Kovačević case, Lekić recently told "Vijesti" that he would not "invite immunity" and that he expects an acquittal.
"I think I'm right. It's true that I made a mistake. I was drunk that night, I had 1,22 per mille. But as for the cause of the traffic accident, I'm not at fault. I expect an acquittal from the court...", he said.
When asked by journalists that the decision to lift immunity could only be made by a vote in the Assembly, after the Administrative Committee gives the "green light", Lekić reiterated that he would not "invite immunity", but that he would not ask his colleagues from the parliamentary majority to lift his protection.
"I will not invoke myself, and if I personally request (the lifting of immunity) - I will not do that... It seems to me that, in any case, the court and the prosecutor's office can conduct this procedure on certain matters, until the moment when the MP invokes immunity. When it comes to that stage, I will not invoke immunity - I will let it go. And I am even interested in this being resolved as soon as possible, because I am sure that I am not guilty," he told "Vijesti".
According to the Constitution (Article 86), criminal proceedings cannot be initiated against a member of parliament, nor can he be detained without the approval of the highest legislative house, unless he is caught committing a criminal offense for which a penalty of more than five years in prison is prescribed.
The Administrative Committee did not discuss at all the request of the Podgorica Higher Prosecutor's Office to reject the criminal prosecution of Lekić's predecessor Kovačević for the criminal offense of inciting national, racial and religious hatred. This parliamentary working body, headed by a member of parliament from the Europe Now Movement Jelena Nedović, ignored the request of the Higher Prosecutor's Office for almost a year, despite its urgent requests.
Nedović repeatedly justified this by saying that they were waiting for the prosecution to submit an indictment against Kovačević. However, in order for the indictment to be filed, the criminal proceedings had to be completed, and they could not even begin until Kovačević's immunity was lifted.
In the past few years, the Special State Prosecutor's Office (SDT) has opened several cases due to business decisions made by Lekić while he was the executive director of RUP, which were then consolidated and submitted to the Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Bijelo Polje. The Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Bijelo Polje told "Vijesti" in early July that an economic expert is still investigating the case opened against Lekić.
The new-old NSD MP served as RUP's executive director from the beginning of 2021 to August 2023, and was dismissed after the Labor Inspectorate determined that he had been elected to the position in gross violation of the law, i.e. without a competition. After leaving the directorship, it did not take him long to return to management positions at RUP - he was first appointed as a member, and then as the president of the company's Board of Directors.
At the end of 2022, the SDT filed a case against Lekić based on a criminal complaint filed by the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS), which claimed that he “by exploiting and exceeding the limits of his official position, concluded a harmful contract for the purchase and sale of brown lignite coal with Elektroprivreda Srbije at a price of 28,80 euros, even though he knew that this was not the real price of coal”. This happened at a time when the Serbian energy system was paying Bosnia and Herzegovina for coal at a minimum price of 65 euros per ton. The Coal Mine said at the time that these were different calorific values of coal and that the price could not be the same.
Six months later, the SDT opened an investigation due to suspicions of abuse of official position in that business, and in June 2023 and August last year, officers of the Special Police Department also seized business documentation related to that business from the Pljevlja company.
The prosecutor's office, based on the same criminal complaint, also investigated allegations regarding the purchase of dump trucks (special trucks) from the Bosnian-Herzegovinian company "BPS Ugljevik" for 3,5 million euros excluding VAT, which, as claimed by the DPS, was a million euros higher than the price for the same vehicles purchased the year before.
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