Some employees of Radio Television of Montenegro (RTCG), some of whom were candidates for the position of Director General of RTCG, announced today that they have filed a criminal complaint with the Basic State Prosecutor's Office (ODT) in Podgorica against the President of the RTCG Council, Veselin Drljević, for what they said was "plagiarism of a doctoral thesis".
The criminal complaint was filed by Srđan Čović, Snežana Rakonjac, Tanja Šuković, Mladen Vukčević, Vesna Banović, Slaven Knezović, Časlav Vujotic, Vesna Terić, Nataša Baranin and Žarko Božović.
"Veselin Drljević presents himself to the Montenegrin public as a doctor and assistant professor. A simple look at the doctoral thesis 'Perspectives of Sports Tourism Development in Montenegro' which he defended at Alfa University in Belgrade shows that he copied 36 pages of the Master Plan of Montenegrin Tourism published by the Ministry of Tourism of Montenegro in 2008. In the 'doctorate' from pages 103 to 138, the text from pages 33 to 64 of the Master Plan of Montenegrin Tourism is completely reproduced, with the paragraphs being changed by 'taking away' the previous sentence or 'adding it to the next', so they appear chopped up," reads the criminal complaint submitted to the media by Vujotić.
The criminal complaint adds that "subsequently asked to explain the textual identity of the documents we are mentioning, Veselin Drljević said that 'no one would do it intentionally'".
"In addition, he attached a statement of authorship to his famous doctorate: that he did not use the copyrights of other persons and that everything is the result of his own research work. We think that it is a bad example in the scientific and educational system that titles and titles are obtained through, to put it mildly, unethical processes, because then values, virtues and expertise lose their meaning and significance," the criminal complaint states.
The applicants state that special attention must be paid to this case "because it was with the highest academic title that Veselin Drljević presented himself to the Administrative Committee of the Parliament of Montenegro, which elected him as a member, and then president, of the RTCG Council."
"His presidential activities are being witnessed by the outraged public these days, unfortunately, in connection with the two illegal elections of Boris Raonic (confirmed by the court) for the general director of an institution with over 750 employees, and we suspect many more, and a budget of 20 million euros (provided by Montenegrin citizens). And in connection with the last, third election, they are subject to suspicion and will soon be subject to judicial review," the criminal complaint states.
The applicants also stated that they had previously contacted the Ethics Committee of the University of Montenegro, but that they had not responded to their appeals.
"It seems that there is a strong correlation between academic unethicality and dishonesty and the poor and illegal acquisition of public office. We will agree that this is disastrous for society, institutions and the state, Montenegro. Therefore, in this case, a criminal offense against intellectual property occurred, i.e. a violation of the moral rights of authors and interpreters under Article 233 of the Criminal Code of Montenegro, i.e. point 2, which stipulates that 'whoever publishes under his own name, in whole or in part, another's copyrighted work on the basis of which he is elected to a scientific or teaching-scientific position, shall be punished by a fine or a sentence of up to four years in prison'," the criminal complaint states.
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