The High Court will issue a decision by the end of this month in two cases on appeal against the Basic Court judgments from June and October 2025, which established that Boris Raonic A year earlier, he was illegally elected for the third time as the director of Radio Television of Montenegro (RTCG).
This was told to "Vijesti" by the High Court last week.
"We inform you that the cases formed upon appeal of the Basic Court's judgments according to which Boris Raonić was illegally appointed to the position of General Director are still pending. It is expected that they will be reported on during this month. The court is acting within all available spatial and personnel capacities, striving to ensure efficient and lawful work," they responded and explained that the public will be informed of the decisions in a timely manner.
Meanwhile, a judge at the Basic Court in Podgorica Nikola Boskovic issued a ruling that annulled as unlawful the RTCG Decision from August 2024, by which Raonić was elected as the Director General of RTCG for a four-year term.
This is the third first-instance verdict, following a lawsuit. Caslav Vujotic, which relates to the latest appointment of Raonić to the position of general director of the public service. Previously, the same decision was made in the Basic Court and upon the complaints of the candidates Andrijan Kadija i Zarko Bozovic in July, and then after the lawsuit Slaven Knezović in October last year.
“Power and politics govern public service”
The nine verdicts up to yesterday that explain the illegal decisions of the current Council, which persistently elected Boris Raonic to the position of general director, to which he was not worthy, have given good grounds for expectations that the jubilee, tenth verdict will be no different.
This was assessed by a member of the RTCG Council for "Vijesti" yesterday. Marijana Camović Veličković.
"In the four and a half years that Raonić has been usurping that position, apart from the lawyers who are paid to do so, no one has said that his persistent selection is in line with the law or that this man meets the required conditions. So, it is a matter of force and a political decision that someone like them, who is suitable, runs the public service," believes Camović Večičković.
She also emphasized that "it is important not to delude ourselves that a final court ruling means that Raonic will no longer be in the position he usurped because there is always the possibility that, for example, they could appoint him as acting president, which they have already done once."
"It will not be a problem for those members of the Council who have already been convicted in the first instance for abuse of office to do so, precisely from the positions they continued to hold after the verdict, which is unthinkable, but it is possible in a country that thinks it is the next EU member state," Camović Velicković assessed.
Illegal mandate is not relevant work experience
The Basic Court, the latest first-instance judgment states, determined that it indisputably follows from the evidence presented and final decisions in earlier proceedings that Boris Raonić performed the duties of the General Director of RTCG in the periods after the Council's decisions in 2021 and 2023, but it is also indisputable that it was precisely these decisions (i.e. the decisions that enabled the performance of the management function) that were finally annulled as unlawful. It is stated that in the judgments in which the aforementioned decisions were annulled, the court determined that the selected candidate did not meet the prescribed conditions for selection at the relevant moments, including the special condition of work experience at the level of educational qualification that was prescribed at that time (10 years), and that the Council was obliged to assess the situation at the time of the announcement of the competition, and not the circumstances that arose subsequently, and that the unlawful situation cannot be allowed to be corrected subsequently.
The judgment also states that accepting that the disputed period counts as relevant work experience would violate the principle of equality of candidates because others who applied for the position of director of RTCG would be prevented from doing so under equal conditions, given that they did not have the opportunity to gain management experience in the same position through performing duties that the court had already deemed unlawful.
10 first-instance or final judgments have been issued by Montenegrin courts since mid-2021, when Raonić was first appointed as the head of RTCG. Each of these judgments found that he was appointed illegally.
The court also took into account the Inspection Report, in which the labor inspectorate concluded that the appointed candidate (Raonić) met the requirement of at least five years of work experience in management positions.
"However, the court finds that the aforementioned minutes cannot have a decisive significance for resolving the disputed issue in these proceedings, since they are based on the interpretation of work experience within the meaning of the Labor Law and within the jurisdiction of the labor inspection, which relates to the legality of the establishment and duration of the employment relationship, while in the specific case the subject of the court's assessment is exclusively the fulfillment of the special qualification requirement for appointment to the public office of the Director General of RTCG, prescribed by a separate law," the verdict states.
According to Bošković's judgment, it follows from the content of the contested decision that the RTCG Council based the selection of Boris Raonić on general assessments that during the period in which he performed the duties of the General Director, a significant increase in viewership was achieved, that the balance of the news program was improved, that some of the goals set in the strategic document of the public service were achieved, and that the draft development and work program of the selected candidate was more aligned with the RTCG Development Strategy 2023-2027 compared to the programs of the other candidates.
"However, the court finds that the reasons given in this way remain at the level of abstract and general statements, devoid of any concretization, which is why it cannot be determined from the reasoning which criteria were decisive, and there is also no indication of how these criteria were assessed in relation to all the candidates who applied," the verdict concludes.
A decision on abuse of office is awaited.
The High Court responded to "Vijesti" yesterday that in mid-December last year they were assigned a criminal case based on an appeal against the Basic Court's decision that dismissed the President of the RTCG Council. Veselin Drljević and three members of that body - Filip Lazović, Amina Murić i Naod Zoric found guilty of abuse of office.
They explained that the case is ongoing and that a decision has not yet been made. According to the ruling of the Podgorica Basic Court, Drljević, Lazović, Murić and Zorić are guilty of abuse of office because, even after a final ruling that he had been previously illegally appointed, they re-elected Raonić as director of RTCG in 2023. Judge Dragan Lubarda The first-instance verdict sentenced them to a suspended sentence of seven months, on the condition that they do not commit a new criminal offense within two years.
Bonus video:
