"Transition winners" will remain untouchable: "Anti-Mafia Law" does not provide for proceedings against suspicious assets

The new law on confiscation of criminal assets is a step forward, but it will not allow the state to investigate how someone acquired millions of dollars in assets without legal income, without first initiating criminal proceedings, which is the biggest limitation of this regulation - claims the deputy executive director of the Network for the Affirmation of the Non-Governmental Sector (MANS) Dejan Milovac.

He told "Vijesti" that the regulation adopted by the Parliament on Thursday evening at the proposal of the Government cannot in any way be called an "anti-mafia law", as the government presents it to the public.

"Montenegro needed a real anti-mafia law, based on civil proceedings against suspicious assets, strong financial investigations, specialized and independent institutions, strict judicial control, and full transparency in the management of confiscated assets," he said.

He reminds that Montenegro has already wasted too much time waiting for a solution tailored to a country where organized crime and high corruption have created enormous assets for decades, while institutions have shown that they are incapable of finding and permanently confiscating them.

"After so much waiting, an insufficiently ambitious law was adopted, which does not fully meet the real needs of Montenegrin society," Milovac pointed out.

The government presented the regulation as a long-awaited mechanism that would hit crime where it is most vulnerable - in property matters, arguing that the law has sufficient judicial guarantees and EU support. The opposition, during the parliamentary debate, did not dispute the need to seize criminally acquired wealth, but warned that permanent confiscation before a final verdict raises issues of the presumption of innocence, property rights and possible selective political application.

43 government representatives voted in favor of adopting the law and Zoran Mikić from the Civic Movement URA, while the opposition did not attend the decision-making.

The regulation also introduces a special model of permanent confiscation of property (worth at least 50 thousand euros) before a final judgment is rendered in strictly prescribed cases of organized crime. The bill also provided that a property gain worth at least five thousand euros, for which there is a reasonable suspicion that it was acquired through criminal activity, may be confiscated from a finally convicted perpetrator, unless it is made probable that its origin is legal, but after the Government acted through an amendment, this monetary threshold was deleted. This means that such property will be able to be confiscated regardless of its value.

President of Montenegro Jakov Milatovic yesterday he proclaimed the law. His cabinet announced that the state's response to crime must not be limited to criminal punishment of perpetrators, but must also include the effective confiscation of property acquired through crime.

"Only in this way can a clear message be sent that crime must not be profitable," they said.

Procedure related to persons, not property

Dejan Milovac points out that the fact that the law allows for the seizure of property before a final verdict - but only in limited cases related to criminal organizations and only after the indictment has passed judicial review - is not an independent civil model of asset seizure as MANS has advocated for years, but only a limited addition to the existing system.

As he explained, the procedure under this law is not conducted primarily against suspicious property, independent of the criminal proceedings, but remains tied to a specific person and the existence of a criminal case against him.

"Even when it allows for the confiscation of (property) before a final verdict, the law requires prior initiation of proceedings and a confirmed indictment for criminal offenses committed within the framework of a criminal organization," Milovac said.

Therefore, he adds, the law does not open up a real possibility of retroactively examining the origin of vast assets acquired over previous decades, if there is no appropriate criminal procedure for their owners today.

"Thus, the largest part of the so-called original accumulation of dirty capital will remain outside its real reach, as will many individuals who enriched themselves during the transition at the expense of citizens, state property and the budget," he warned, adding that this is the law's greatest limitation.

According to him, Montenegro will not be able to ask a simple question - how did someone, without legal income, acquire millions in property? Instead, institutions will first have to link such a person to a specific criminal offense and initiate criminal proceedings.

"After decades of institutional silence, outdated cases, missing evidence, and protected individuals, it is clear that a large portion of illicitly acquired wealth will once again remain untouchable," he said.

Assets from high-level corruption cases can be bypassed

Milovac points out that such a solution could leave out of reach of regulations and huge assets clearly disproportionate to legal income, in cases of high corruption, which are not formally linked to a criminal organization.

"Therefore, there is a big difference between the political name 'anti-mafia law' and what the Parliament actually adopted," he said.

As he added, the law does not prescribe clearly enough what exactly the prosecution must prove in order for the court to conclude that certain property was acquired through crime, which leaves room for different interpretations.

According to Milovac, a particular problem is the existing capacities of the prosecution and police to conduct financial investigations. He recalls that Montenegro does not have a sufficient number of specialized financial investigators, economic and tax experts, forensic accountants and prosecutors trained to monitor complex money flows, hidden ownership, international transactions, company structures and digital assets.

"The formation of financial investigation teams is left by law only as an option, instead of being mandatory in complex cases of organized crime and high-level corruption. There are no minimum staffing and technical standards, deadlines for data exchange, or clear accountability for institutions that fail to provide data or act on prosecutorial requests," he said.

He warns that without serious investment in people, databases and international cooperation, the new law may remain just another tool that exists on paper.

Financial investigations, he says, cannot be conducted as an adjunct to a criminal investigation, but must begin immediately, in parallel with it, and monitor the entire flow of money - including formal and real owners, related parties, family members, companies and assets abroad.

"It is also problematic that the temporary blocking of assets can last for years without mandatory periodic judicial control. At the same time, the executive branch and the body that manages state property are given broad powers to manage private companies, lease, and in some cases sell property before a final court decision," Milovac explained.

He pointed out that such powers are not accompanied by an appropriate level of transparency. The law, he said, provides for record-keeping, but does not oblige institutions to regularly publish complete and comparable data on the results of its application.

It indicates that the public must know how many financial investigations have been initiated and suspended, how much property has been temporarily blocked, how much has been permanently seized, how much has been returned to its owners, and how much citizens have paid in damages due to failed proceedings.

"Data must also be available on who manages the seized companies, to whom the property was leased or used, at what price it was sold, who assessed its value, and what the costs of its storage and management were," he stressed.

The interlocutor warns that, without this data, the authorities will again be able to present the value of temporarily blocked property as the final result, although some of that property may later be returned to its owners.

"MANS has been warning for years that temporary seizure does not represent a success if the procedure is not based on a quality investigation and if it does not end with a final seizure," said Milovac.

According to him, the true test of the law will therefore not be the number of open proceedings, prosecutorial statements and press conferences, but the value of property that has been legally seized, well preserved and returned to citizens.

An even more important test, he says, will be whether the law will be applied equally to everyone - to members of the former and current government, their business partners, family members and related persons.

"Selective application would turn this law into a tool for political reckoning, instead of a mechanism for fighting organized crime and corruption," warned the executive director of MANS.

Koprivica: Earthquake in criminal circles

From the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister Moma Koprivica (Democrats) announced yesterday that the adoption of the "anti-mafia law" has already caused a stir in criminal circles, because "it is clear that in Montenegro the time when crime paid off and illegally acquired wealth could be preserved is irrevocably ending."

"The essence of the law is clear, which is that illegally acquired property must be confiscated, and that the state receives stronger mechanisms to deprive criminals of the economic benefits of their activities," the statement said.

He emphasizes that it is particularly important that the law, under clearly prescribed conditions and with judicial control, allows for the permanent confiscation of such property even before a final verdict in organized crime cases, and the burden of proof is on the owner - to make it probable that its origin is legal.

"By doing so, we are sending a clear message that crime will never again be a business model and that illegally acquired wealth cannot be hidden and preserved," Koprivica's cabinet said.

Vice President of the opposition Democratic People's Party (DNP) Milun Zogović He announced yesterday that we should start immediately “returning what was looted to the state and citizens.” He welcomed the adoption of the law, although his party's deputies were not in the chamber during the vote.

Zogović believes that it is particularly important to include and review those who obtained illegal property through abuse of official position and influence peddling, as well as various organized criminal groups that "plundered state property" through various formats that they illegally and unfoundedly established. The most recent example, he says, is the distribution of state apartments and loans "according to a key known to them without any rankings or scoring."

"If someone has lived off their salary for years and has made millions, the question is simple: where did it come from?" said Zogović.

The right solution requires more courage

Milovac says that a "real" legal solution requires much more vision and political courage, and much less concern for party calculations and the profit interests of individuals "who continue to find ways to protect their empires built on dirty money."

"As long as such interests take precedence over public ones, Montenegro will not receive a law capable of truly striking at the economic power of organized crime and corruption," Milovac concluded.