The General Director of the Directorate for Emergency Situations, Mirsad Mulić, refused to answer the question of whether he adequately responded to the task during the days when Montenegro was burning and whether he had the necessary qualifications for the position he was performing.
The professor of Serbo-Croatian language and Yugoslav literature is blamed by many for failing to extinguish large fires on the coast.
Officially or not, many eyewitnesses and participants in the firefighting operations say that Mulić is responsible for poor organization and management at the fire sites, the absence of a crisis headquarters to coordinate manpower and resources.
"I am on the field, in the future we will communicate with the media only through announcements," Mulić told "Vijesta" yesterday.
Mulić worked as a teacher at the high school "Vukadin Vukadinović" in Berane and was the vice-president of the Municipality for the field of culture and social activities, the director of a kindergarten in that city, the director of the Center for the Preservation and Development of Minority Culture and a member of the DPS from March to October 2012. years.
In 2013, he became the head of the MUP's emergency department, succeeding Zoran Begović.
"He is not educated for emergency situations," Patricia Pobrić from the NGO "Naša akcija" told "Vijesta".
Pobrić has a master's degree in organizational leadership with 24 years of managerial experience, mostly in American companies and in workplaces that require preparation and training for emergency situations. She volunteered to help firefighters:
"I watched as fire engines raced from Zagora to Blue Horizons, from Đurašević to Tivatski Solil and Bigova, to put out the fires, while during this time bathers slowly crossed the street and photographed the situation, not thinking of missing the rotating vehicle. I personally stopped the police vehicle from Tivat and asked them, if they are at all able, to control the traffic on the peninsula... We don't know how to control the traffic, let alone manage an emergency situation".
Pobrić states that there was no maritime traffic control and that firefighting planes landed between yachts and sailboats in order to capture the water.
He also adds that citizens received conflicting information about the necessity of providing help in the field through the number published for volunteer applications:
"Some people would say that help on the ground is necessary, others that it is not. In disbelief, people would still go to the field, trying to provide help, but even then they would not get valid information about where they are most needed, so they would run up and down Luštica to see for themselves where they can help".
She, as well as many others, states that it is also problematic that in Boka, on 15 kilometers of the area affected by the fires, there was no fire station commander.
Numerous eyewitnesses criticize Mulić and the Directorate for leaving everything "on the backs of the commanders of the local protection services".
Zoran Barbić, the commander of the Tivat Protection and Rescue Service, expressed objections to the reactions of the authorities, who previously said that since the beginning of the big fires, together with the head of the Tivat Security Department, Milovan Radović, he advocated for international help. Barbić says that "without the support of fire fighting aviation from abroad, the fires could not have been quickly brought under control".
The government asked for help in the late afternoon hours of the second day of the fire, after the evacuation of more than 300 people from Luštica and after an appeal by the mayors of the three Bokelje municipalities, Snežana Matijević, Vladimir Jokić and Stevan Katić. DVS announced at the beginning of May, when they presented the "Fire Protection Month" campaign, that they are ready for the fire season and that they react in complex situations.
Mulić then announced that citizens must believe in the capacities and resources of the protection and rescue system and announced more intensive work by the Directorate for Inspection Supervision and cooperation with the Police Directorate, with the aim of finding those who start fires. During the entire period of active fires, as was announced on Thursday after the Government session, none of the potential instigators was discovered, except for the arrest of arsonists in Podgorica.
Pobrić assessed that the local protection services and administration cannot be held responsible.
"They have been 'screaming' for years that they don't have enough equipment - they don't have guts, or they are hollow on all sides. In some locations, firefighters put out fires wearing plastic surgical gloves."
When asked by a journalist why Mulić is not on the ground while Tivat is fighting the biggest forest fire since 2003, his superior, the Minister of Internal Affairs Mevludin Nuhodžić, replied that he is there instead of him, and that Mulić is on assignment - at a donor conference that is "very important for the Emergency Situations Sector".
Begović was decorated with diplomas, but he was rescued from snowdrifts
Unlike his successor - Mulić, Begović's biography supports the position and tasks for which he was responsible - as early as 1992 he worked in the MUP, and six years later he was the head of the inspectorate for protection against fire, explosions, breakdowns and technical protection of buildings. .
He defended his doctorate on the topic "Conceptual foundations and institutionalization of Montenegro's strategy for civil emergency situations" in 2011.
In the public, however, it remained recorded that as the assistant minister of the interior for emergency situations - he himself was saved. In February 2012, during heavy snowfall, he got stuck in the snowdrifts in Međurječe, on the road Podgorica - Kolašin.
Thanks for the €400 each, but that's not enough
The local protection services say that they are mostly satisfied with the cooperation with DVS, but they also point out problems - earnings and lack of equipment.
The commander of the Podgorica Service Andrija Čađenović hopes that the resulting situation will contribute to the further modernization of working conditions. According to Chief Drago Popović, the Žabljak firefighters would need another truck with a tank to fight the fire. He says that the Government's decision to give firefighters 400 euros each is a well-deserved stimulus, but not a permanent solution, nor adequate compensation.
"Regarding all, not only the material segments of the employees, a great obligation and duty will be on the branch union, which we will oblige to persevere in solving the accumulated problems," says Popović.
The Kolašin firefighters also complain about the working conditions and the quality of the equipment, of which 10 were employed after systematization.
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