The Municipality of Ulcinj has recently submitted to the Constitutional Court a proposal for the constitutionality assessment of Article Three Paragraph One of the Law on Marine Resources and Articles 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 and 7 of the Decision on Adopting a Special Purpose Spatial Plan for the Coastal Area of Montenegro.
This was confirmed today at the press conference by the President of the Municipality, Omer Bajraktari.
"Because for decades we in Ulcinj have been talking about the injustice, that is, the discrimination to which we as a municipality and the citizens of Ulcinj have been exposed since the formation of the Public Enterprise for the Management of the Marine Property and the determination of the line of the marine property. And everything that was the product of those harmful decisions, here are the entire 30 year", said Bajraktari.
He said that regardless of these facts, there was no fundamental action in Ulcinj to try to legally change the situation, except for some sporadic protests and gatherings of citizens and non-governmental organizations.
"Because the injustice and damage that was done to us and is being done to us, is measured not only in tens of millions of euros, but above all in the fact that we, as a local self-government, cannot plan and direct our development by ourselves. And that is the fundamental principle of the European Charter on local self-government. According to the famous Swiss scientist Jost Krippendorff, space is the most effective tool in the hands of the municipality and it must not let it out of its hands," said Bajraktari.
He claims that the most valuable area of Ulcinj was taken systematically and planned, by the decisions of the then Government of Montenegro and the adoption of a series of by-laws.
"So it happened that the ad hoc formed commissions determine the line of maritime property in Ulcinj that covers the area that is two kilometers away from the sea, even though the law states that it can reach 'a maximum of six meters from the biggest wave at the time of the biggest storm'. Judging by these experts, a tsunami is constantly washing over us, even though we don't see it and we don't feel it. Of course, that is incorrect, but no one has questioned the line for three decades," said Bajraktari.
He stated that as much as 57 percent of the territory of marine resources is located in Ulcinj, and in all other municipalities of Montenegro together, in Bar, Budva, Kotor, Tivat and Herceg Novi only 43 percent.
This, as he said, means that 3.318,4 hectares, or 3,3 million square meters, or 13 percent of the municipality's territory, are under the maritime domain in Ulcinj.
This, he added, is ten times more than in Bar, where 1,3 percent of the territory of that neighboring municipality is covered by marine resources.
"So the following absurdity can also happen, the house of one of our Ulcinj citizens, which is cadastrally located in both municipalities, on the territory of Ulcinj is in the zone of marine property, and in Bar it is not. Or that the banks of the Bojana River are marine property, which is a unique case in the world, without, for example, Solana," said Bajraktari.
That is why in the initiative, he stated, referring in detail to the practice of the European Court of Human Rights, it is pointed out that the key provisions of the Law on Maritime Property are unconstitutional.
"It was on the basis of this discriminatory legal act that the Special Purpose Spatial Plan for the coastal area was worked out, in which the whole of Ulcinj was then squeezed in. And let's remember that the Government also worked on the Spatial-Urban Plan of our municipality. As it was pointed out at the time, for financial reasons. And it is, because if you calculate that one square meter of land in the marine property zone costs 150 euros, then its total value is half a billion euros. And even when it is drawn, the price of the space increases drastically. Milina and width, 33 kilometers of coastline , half of which are sandy beaches," said Bajraktari.
He said that this unequal fight for their space and dignity was witnessed by the public in all previous years – from Valdanos through Borova šuma, Velika plaža and Solana to Ada.
"In the same way, investments in the zone of marine resources in Ulcinj were much smaller than in other municipalities, so, for example, the reconstruction of the Great Pier or the renovation of the pedestrian path from the Hotel 'Albatros' to Cape Đerana has not been completed for years. And investments realized by JP indicate unequal treatment, i.e. disproportionality and discrimination towards our local self-government and its citizens," Bajraktari assessed.
He concluded that in any case, when you look at the line of marine property and the actions of the central authorities in the past few decades, it is clear that it is a question of the desire and intention to seize the resources of the municipality of Ulcinj in an allegedly legal way and to manage them without the right to decide locally community.
"If it is known that the majority population in Ulcinj is Albanian, then we are talking about discrimination against a minority nation. Bearing in mind that the rights of citizens and the Municipality of Ulcinj are continuously being violated due to the above reasons, we have asked the Constitutional Court of Montenegro to act on this as a matter of priority to our initiative. We believe that this largest judicial instance in the country will act accordingly and make a just decision. If not, when we are all fed up with Europe, we will go to Strasbourg," said Bajraktari.
Bonus video:
