Clubs of pensioners who, on the basis of a sublease agreement with the Association of Pensioners of Podgorica, used the premises of the Capital City, reduced the socialization of the users to serving drinks, in some cases gambling, and after the termination of the contract, they did not fulfill their obligations, so they were left with unpaid bills for electricity, water, garbage...
Due to outstanding obligations, the current administration of the Capital City, as they told "Vijesta", will file lawsuits.
"It is obvious that there are still debts for electricity, water and the removal and disposal of waste, which resulted in the power being cut off, so in order to ensure the smooth operation of local communities, we have made payments, and in connection with this we are preparing claims to compensate for the material damage created from the capital city's budget", the acting secretary of the Secretariat for Local Self-Government and Cooperation with Civil Society told "Vijesti" Slađana Anđušić.
From the Capital City, however, they did not answer what amounts were involved, nor what the total debt was.
Some of the clubs, according to data from the portal of the Revenue and Customs Administration, did not even submit annual financial statements, and some, according to the same data, were already in bankruptcy in the first year when the space was given to them.
At the last session of the Assembly of the Capital City, the Decision was adopted on revoking the Decision on giving the use of space owned by the Capital City to the Association of Pensioners Podgorica free of charge.
Decision and contracts on sublease 2019.
In July 2019, the capital city made a decision on the use of spaces owned by the Municipality and, without compensation, ceded more space to the Association of Pensioners Podgorica "in order to achieve the goals of the Association, which are of special importance for the capital city".
In the text of the decision, among other things, it is stated that the user in the space will "organize the performance of activities that enable socialization, organization of socially useful activities and use of the remaining potential of pensioners of the Capital City...".
In September of the same year, the Capital City and the Association of Pensioners signed a lease agreement, according to which nearly 18 square meters of space were available for 900 local associations.
A month later, the Association signed sublease contracts with 16 pensioners' clubs.
In the contract between the Capital City and the Association of Pensioners, among other things, it is stated that the users of the space are obliged to pay the costs of using and maintaining the space. The costs, as it says, are utilities, such as electricity, water, telecommunications... and if the space is in a building, a maintenance fee for the common areas of the residential building should also be paid.
In the same document, it is stated that, if the space is used by someone else, the obligation to pay costs and maintenance falls on the subtenant.
CEGAS: Abuse of local communities
Based on a request for free access to information (FIA), "Vijesti" received copies of the sublease agreement from the Capital City of Podgorica. According to them, the Association of Pensioners subleased the premises to the clubs "Zagorič", "Momišići", "Konik", "Ljubović", "19. December", "Nova varoš", "Stara varoš", "Stari aerodrome", "Jedinstvo", "Ubli", "Lijeva Rijeka", "Masline", "Block V and VI", "Donja Gorica", "13. July" and "Zabjelo".
The sublease contracts are identical, with the exception of the area that is given for use.
In each of them, already in article two, it is stated that the contractor 2, i.e. the pensioners' club, "undertakes to provide the members of the Club with the services of serving beverages, alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, determined by the Decision on the establishment of the Club, at prices determined by a unique price list, which adopted by the Management Board of the Association, and on the proposal of the Commission for Clubs".
It is added that "the beverages in question must be purchased in retail, with an indication on the invoices that VAT has been paid, and the prescribed documentation must be properly maintained".
The Center for Civil Liberties (CEGAS) previously warned about the abuses of local communities and their dysfunctionality. Jovana Božović from that non-governmental organization told "Vijesta" that in this case the emphasis is exclusively on the competences and obligations of the former representatives of the Secretariat for Local Self-Government.
"Who were obliged to control the obligations and rights arising from the contract for the lease of business premises, which were concluded between the Capital City of Podgorica and the Pensioners' Association, which further concluded sublease contracts with pensioners' clubs," she told "Vijesti".
In the Lease Agreement, it is specified that "the user will regularly submit evidence of paid expenses to the Secretariat no later than the 20th of the month for the previous month".
"For this reason, numerous debts owed to suppliers by sub-tenants are inexplicable," said Božović.
He also considers the way of using the space to be problematic.
"If in the contract for the lease of office space, there is an obligation to use the space for the purpose of 'socialization, organization of socially beneficial activities and use of the remaining potential of pensioners of the Capital City', the sublease contracts should not have involved the provision of services 'serving beverages, alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages', determined by the Decision on the establishment of the Club, unless the bar is the only means of socialization. In addition to all the shortcomings of this allocation of space and its abuse, based on the sublease agreement, all subtenants were obliged to settle any debts related to the space they used, properly settle bills for electricity, water, cleanliness, landfill and maintenance of other communal services , and return the premises to their previous state," said Božović.
"There was no control in the past"
The Secretariat for Local Self-Government and Cooperation with Civil Society of the Capital City confirmed to "Vijesta" that pensioners' clubs did not regularly settle their contractual obligations, and that their activities were not controlled in the past.
"When it comes to the Agreement with the Podgorica Pensioners' Association and the sublease agreements that this association concluded with pensioners' clubs (which were essentially taverns, some equipped with gambling machines), it is clear that there was no control by the Secretariat in the past , because if it was, there would be no debts", Acting Secretary Slađana Anđušić told "Vijesta".
Pensioners' clubs, according to the contract with the Association of Pensioners, were also obliged to register with the court, as a legal entity. Also, as stated in the contracts, they were obliged to provide a cash register, through which they would record the entire turnover.
According to the financial statements that are publicly available on the portal of the Revenue and Customs Administration, the Pensioners' Club "19. December" he submitted the last report for 2020, "Stari aerodrom" is in bankruptcy, and the only statement submitted is from 2014. The pensioners' clubs "Nova varoš" and "Zagorič", which submitted financial statements in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018, are also bankrupt.
Regular financial statements are submitted by the Pensioners' Club "Stara varoš", which reported a deficit of around 750 euros for the past year.
By searching the public database of the website of the Revenue Administration, it is not possible to obtain information about the majority of pensioners' clubs with which the Association has signed space sublease contracts.
The money of the city is the money of the citizens
In August, the capital city announced that their officials, visiting the city premises where the local communities (MZ) are located, discovered that there was an illegal tavern in the premises of the MZ "Ljubović" and that the premises had been converted into a place of residence. Previously, the "Ljubović" pensioners' club was located in those premises.
"It is clear that they functioned as taverns," says Anđušić, after visiting other spaces that were subleased.
"Which was recognized by the competent inspection and passed a decision on the closure of these facilities. "I recently spoke with several representatives of local associations of pensioners and we agreed that spaces for our oldest fellow citizens are needed, but with some other contents, which will obviously require the creation of a new legal framework," she said.
In February, the sub-tenants were informed about the termination of the contract and that the premises would be returned to the Capital City as the owner, but the handover, says Andušić, did not take place until September.
Due to the debts that the clubs left behind, as she said, the Secretariat is preparing payments.
"Our task is to take care of the way in which the City's money, which is also the citizens' money, is spent. We will prepare the documentation and give it to the competent administration, so that they can sue the debtors", said Andjušić.
CEGAS said that local communities must be returned to the citizens, "in order to develop local democracy, joint association and change at the local level".
"The Secretariat for Local Self-Government, as well as the Municipality itself, should take care of all of this, which together must create an environment for the smooth operation of local communities, in such a way that it is managed and decided only by the citizens of that locality," said the NGO. .
When asked what will be done to restore local communities to their citizens, Andušić said that "local self-government is a really complex topic":
"And I believe that we have a whole process waiting for us, an important link of which is the decision on local communities, the preparation of which began with the consultation of citizens."
Citizens want to ask them about their needs
The Secretariat for Local Self-Government conducted two surveys on the topic of local communities.
Anđušić told "Vijesta" that for one of them, the written one, they concluded that it was not relevant and that one person entered the answers several times, which is why they decided to repeat the survey and limit the entry based on the IP address.
"Given that our work is not pro forma, the opinion of citizens is already important to us, we conducted an electronic survey, from one IP address one answer. It can truly be said that the survey is an example of what local democracy should look like. Many good ideas and concrete answers will give us inputs for further work, because citizens are important to us", she said.
The results of the survey are not yet publicly known. Unofficially, the majority of citizens still do not know about the rights they can exercise in the Ministry of Health. According to the same data, citizens expressed the need to be more involved in decision-making. The majority is not satisfied with the current work of the Ministry of Health.
A similar questionnaire was carried out in April by "Vijesti" and CEGAS. The results showed that some citizens believe that political parties and politicians abuse local communities to achieve their goals, but some of them answered that they still serve the common good. The largest number of citizens who responded to the questionnaire said that their Ministry of Health never helped them exercise their rights, that they do not know who the leading people are, how it is financed, and how their local community spends money...
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