Judges are in trouble when they judge someone important

Citizens recognize doctors, customs officers and inspectors as the most corrupt, Miloš Bešić warns that in the judiciary, more than bribes, there are other mechanisms for corruption
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Disclaimer: The translations are mostly done through AI translator and might not be 100% accurate.
Ažurirano: 18.12.2012. 08:29h

Although a relatively small number of citizens have personal experience with corruption, the top recognized corrupt services are customs, judiciary, health and municipal administrations, and more people this year than last year believe that corruption is present.

This was shown by the Research "Risk of corruption in the judicial system and in the business sector", which methodologist Miloš Bešić conducted for the Center for Democracy (CEDEM). Inefficiency of the police, lack of political will and selective application of laws in the field of judiciary and public procurement are identified as key reasons.

Teachers hardly take bribes

The majority of respondents believe that it is necessary to offer money to health workers, customs officers and inspectors of inspection services in order to complete the work.

"Next come police officers, judges and judicial officers, tax officers and employees of municipal services. To a lesser extent, in the opinion of the respondents, it must be offered to councilors and deputies and least of all to teachers and professors," the survey showed.

Asked if the fact that there is no progress compared to last year's research on corruption means that the government is not working well and sufficiently to solve the problem, Bešić said that very large and important things were identified and that he would be surprised if there was any significant progress. "In that case, something very big had to happen in reality," he said.

According to Bešić, the research showed that in the case of the judiciary, the problem is not money "because it is rarely given, but that the key problem is interventions".

"Someone calls a judge on the phone, he doesn't even insist on influencing the verdict, but in relation to his status in the network, in society, the thing is that it implies some kind of intervention. Self-censorship is also a big problem, when judges are guided by mechanisms according to their status has the accused. And there you have banal things, no one called him, bribed him, but he knows that the one he is judging is very important and that is a big problem," explained Bešić.

Some lawyers play dirty

As a problem, he cited the uneven practice pointed out by the lawyers - that two identical cases are judged differently:

"It turned out that there are cases of disobeying the law, but also that lawyers can cause a problem because they ask the parties for money to bribe the judge, and they don't do it, nor do they even think of trying. And sometimes citizens do it themselves because they heard that everything is corrupt. , so at the start they ask who they should give money to, and corruption is often the reason for justifying the loss of the dispute".

He pointed out that the problem of self-censorship still remains, as well as that there are no effective sanctions against individuals who deserve to be punished for their inefficiency and lack of professional credibility.

"The lack of arguments for the decisions they make remains one of the problems in the work of judges," the Analytical part of the report states.

During the interviews with lawyers and judges during the research, as general problems in the judiciary, the lawyers cited the incompetence of judges, parties and even lawyers, political influence on judges as the main "stumbling block", but the indifference of judges, selective decision-making, poor working conditions and poor communication with other state bodies.

In the report, it is written that some of the lawyers expressed very harsh condemnations of the work of higher judicial instances, when it comes to the problem of political influence.

"The dominant opinion is that the situation in the basic courts is relatively good and that the work of the judges is quite high-quality, but that problems arise at higher instances, primarily at the High Court and the Court of Appeal. by the court in Podgorica.

Trusted judges advance

"This respondent states that he suspects very specific cases of influence on judges of higher instances. One of the arguments is that 'all privatizations were carried out in the Commercial Court and could not be done without trusted judges, that these judges have progressed and are now in the Court of Appeal. And now these people are literally protecting each other," the document states.

According to CEDEM's research, participation in political life through the legal profession is being misused and an uncompetitive market is being created in the legal profession.

"These people are the big stumbling blocks for the Montenegrin judiciary. They must be revealed. It must be transparently established who got the apartments from the mayor of Podgorica," reads the statement of an anonymous interviewee from the ranks of lawyers.

Judges complain that they have too many cases to work on, and because of that they cannot achieve quality. The judges also complained that the media creates an atmosphere of pressure when passing judgments, and neither lawyers nor non-governmental organizations are lagging behind.

Are all tenders being rigged for someone?

According to the respondents, there is no correct and fair tender in Montenegro, they are all arranged for "someone". Regardless of whether the tender procedure is really complicated, respondents emphasize that the complexity of the tender procedure and the amount of paperwork necessary to participate in the tender are enormous.

The mechanisms for filing appeals against the decisions of the tender commissions are still ineffective.

"Again, we find that judges are not aware of the consequences of their decisions on the business sector. Likewise, we find, as last year, that the entrepreneurs themselves promote corruption and corrupt behavior. They are just looking for the easiest way to "get the job done". As in the previous research, we encounter the same complaints regarding the work of inspections and the issuing of construction permits. The first objection refers to the procrastination of the procedure, the slowness and laziness of the administrative staff, and the second problem is interpersonal relations, i.e., the behavior of the competent persons, which was assessed as unpleasant. Citizens believe that efficiency is a bigger problem than transparency. This is the same finding as last year," said Bešić.

Citizens mostly blame the inefficient police and judiciary for corruption

Citizens believe that the key reason for the existence of corruption is inefficient police prosecution (65,6 percent), inefficient judiciary (57,7), lack of political will (52,2), while 50,4 percent of the respondents blame the flawed legislation.

According to Bešić, people generally have a negative and initially reserved attitude towards the judiciary - six percent of respondents believe that it is efficient, 43 that it is mostly, and 36 that it is mostly not.

However, only 15,4 percent of those surveyed stated that they had experience in court, and 17,7 percent of them believe that the judiciary was efficient. The reasons for the ineffectiveness of the courts were identified by citizens in the largest percentage in the answer offered - slowness, indolence, inefficiency and arbitrariness, for which 42 percent of the respondents chose, and 24 percent for the answer corruption and nepotism, while in third place was irresponsibility, unprofessionalism and incompetence.

7,7 percent of citizens believe that judges judge completely according to the law, 46,7 percent mostly do so, mostly not 37,5, and almost never XNUMX percent. Respondents cited politics and political pressure, nepotism, bribery and corruption as the key reasons why judges do not work according to the Law.

Bešić clarified that over 70 percent of the respondents, like last year, said that nothing was asked of them in order to resolve the case in their favor, but that the number of those who say that nothing was asked of them, but are convinced that would have won the case more easily if they had offered money.

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