The Association of Rafters of Montenegro once again submitted to the Constitutional Court an initiative to start the procedure for the review of the constitutionality of the decision on the installation of the ramp and control point for entering the Brštanovica rafting site, as well as the collection of fees, which was adopted by the Plužine Municipal Council last year.
No one responded to the previous initiatives, and the rafters hope that their problem will be solved before the season, which should start next month.
In the initiative submitted on March 8, it is written that the uncategorized road Borikovača - Brštanovica is of local importance and is used daily by the local population, real estate owners, businessmen and entrepreneurs from Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as members of hunting and fishing organizations... The road is also accessible to the Tara River and a ramp and checkpoint were installed on it last year.
The rafters remind that the Law on Rafting, referred to by the SO Plužine, states that on each rafting route there is at least one person responsible for maintaining order and safety, as well as that an uncategorized road does not constitute a rafting route as a waterway or part of it, as it is rafting route defined by law.
Member of the Association of Rafters Veljko Vujanović claims that due to the installation of the ramp and checkpoint, as well as the collection of the tax, the number of tourists last year was over 20 percent lower than the year before, and that they expect this trend of declining tourists to continue this year as well. Vujanović points out that tourists from Šćepan polje to Brštanovica, a road only nine kilometers long, were forced to stop three times.
"On the other side of the river, the municipality of Foča realized the importance of developing tourism on Tara and decided to support its businessmen by building a completely new road 14 kilometers long, so I am sure that the construction of this road in Foča will attract a large number of tourists from Montenegro." . We will get another ramp from the municipality, so maybe it would be good if we take the guests to jump over the ramps instead of rafting. And it's an active vacation," said Vujanović sarcastically.
The rafters claim that with the introduction of fees for the nature park (PP) "Piva" they now have to pay on two bases - 50 cents to the Water Authority, which owns the river, and three euros to the Park, so including the price of the boat, now tourists pay 4,8, XNUMX euros, which, they claim, is a quarter of the gross price of rafting.
"In the Association of Rafters, considering the problems and barriers imposed on them by the improper actions of the authorities and the decisions that are made according to the urgent procedure, they decided to take everything to oppose them. In doing so, we will respect the law, unlike those who organized last year's shows for us," said Vujanović.
Delić: The law is not respected, the ramp is being demolished and there are no passenger lists
Director of PP "Piva" Slobodan Delić said that the Nature Park does not do anything that is not provided for by law and confirmed in practice by the work of national parks.
"We should not forget that the prices in the national parks are much higher and no one complains about it. Thus, for the same mileage in the national park, they have to pay ten euros for rafting, three euros for the entrance fee and five euros for the communal tax," Delić said.
According to him, last year rafters refused to comply with the Law on Rafting because they did not bring lists of passengers, which they were obliged to do, which is why, as he said, they will be sanctioned this year. As he said, last summer, unknown persons repeatedly demolished the ramps and prevented the supervisors from doing their job.
"Whether there were fewer or more tourists last year is best told by the fact that in previous years, the tourism organization, based on excursion fees, recorded 27 to 29 thousand rafting tourists, while last year there were 38.000," said Delić.
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