The municipality of Pljevlja will have to return 3,2 million euros with interest to Elektroprivreda Crne Gore (EPCG), which was illegally collected by the municipal administration 12 years ago, when it was headed by Filip Vuković (DPS), based on the environmental tax.
Two and a half million refers to the principal of the debt, while the amount of interest has reached the amount of 700.000 euros and will grow daily until the debt is paid.
Recently, the Municipality of Pljevlja agreed with the Government to return the illegally charged money in ten installments, that is, over three hundred thousand euros will be paid to EPCG once a year. Thus, the final amount that the municipality will pay to Elektroprivreda based on interest will be significantly higher than the current amount.
"We have huge financial obligations towards EPCG. We have an executive judgment of EPCG according to which we have to return to EPCG 2,5 million euros that we illegally collected and another 700.000 euros in interest. Thanks to the good cooperation and willingness of the gentlemen who run EPCG, we managed to make an agreement that the debt will be paid over the next ten years in annual installments. With this, we relaxed the municipal finances to pay that debt at once", said the President of the Municipality of Pljevlja, Igor Golubović.
Of the total amount collected from EPCG, 1.987.331 euros refer to illegally collected fees from the Thermal Power Plant due to environmental pollution for the period April-September 2007 and for the protection and improvement of the environment for the period from October 12, 2008 to December 31, 2012. The rest of 559.897 euros is in the name of the collected local utility tax from Elektrodistribucija Pljevlja for 2007.
The court did not accept EPCG's request that the interest be calculated from the day when the Municipality forcibly collected the money, but only from May 15, 2015, when the lawsuit was filed. EPCG requested that 1,73 million euros be paid to it in the name of interest. EPCG filed a lawsuit against the Municipality of Pljevlja demanding the refund of the illegally collected environmental tax in the amount of 2.813.114 after, as they claim, the local administration did not want to return the money voluntarily. According to the earlier verdict of the Constitutional Court, the Municipality of Pljevlja illegally collected the amount based on local communal fees for the use of facilities that transmit electricity and fees due to environmental pollution and environmental protection and improvement. In addition to the DPS, the representatives of the opposition parties in the local parliament, who at that time were the parliamentary majority, voted for the adoption of the decision by which the money was collected.
The former president of the Municipality of Pljevlja, Filip Vuković, previously told "Vijesta" that he does not feel responsible that because of the illegal decision he proposed, the citizens of Pljevlja will have to return at least 700.000 in interest to Elektroprivreda.
Councilor Božidar Bajić, who at the time of the adoption of the decision was a councilor of the Serbian Progressive Party, and today of the Movement for Pljevlja, said that even the opposition councilors do not feel responsible that the Municipality will have to pay this amount of interest.
"It would be stupid if we voted against it at that time, and they, as the executive authority, claimed that there was a good chance they would collect the money," said Bajić.
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