The demands of parents of children with developmental disabilities from the protest in front of the Government two months ago have not yet been met, and they are announcing new protests if the situation does not change by September.
Despite millions of allocations from the state budget for the treatment of children with developmental disabilities abroad, systemic solutions within Montenegro are still lacking, and parents are also questioning the location for the construction of a new Day Care Center in Podgorica.
Due to the chronic lack of experts in public institutions dealing with children with developmental disabilities, parents in Montenegro are still forced to take their children to private providers, often unregistered, or to seek treatment abroad.
One of the most common choices is the Institute for Experimental Phonetics and Speech Development "Đorđe Kostić" in Belgrade.
"Jovana was there for about three months and never again. That's what I personally think about them. As for other opinions, we've come across some comments from other parents, which I would say are mixed, from enthusiasm to terrible criticism, to those in between who say we'll see," said Goran Laković, the father of an autistic girl.
An even bigger problem for parents is finances.
"We know that people stay there for half a year, some stay for a year, and that requires large financial resources, it's not just about treatments, because people are referred there for various tests that are very expensive and not covered by our Health Fund," said Laković.
Although the state allocated one million and six hundred thousand euros for the treatment of children at the "Đorđe Kostić" Institute in Belgrade last year alone, a systemic solution in Montenegro is still missing.
"We don't have an exact number, but it's over 500 children. It's a large and significant number of children, and there's an upward trend, so to speak, which is both worrying and something the state should address in a different way," said Radovan Nikolić, assistant director of the Health Fund.
All of this raises the question of why the state is not investing in the education of our professional staff.
"The study program for special education and rehabilitation is still in the accreditation process, when we get the green light, that is, when we get accredited, which, to be realistic, is unlikely for this academic year, but we are working on that and we will definitely have an accredited program," said Vesko Mićanović, Vice-Dean for Education at the University of Montenegro (UCG).
Laković reminds that the state has not yet fulfilled its legal obligation to create a registry of people with autism, nor has the Ministry of Health specified whether the announced registry and Early Development Strategy will include only children and young people up to the age of 27 or all people.
Additionally, he claims that the Podgorica government is announcing the construction of a new Day Care Center in an inadequate location, close to the bus and train stations, and he asks the question: Does anyone who makes decisions about this even know the needs of children with disabilities?
"Anyone who knows about autism knows that it is a sensory disorder, so we know that autistic people are bothered by strong stimuli, and among strong stimuli, noise is also a problem. Now, if they invented some trains that float and are not audible, then that location is completely fine, if not, then it is a completely inadequate location, and the problem was approached in an extremely populist way, in fact deepening the problem," said Laković.
He says that parents will no longer wait indefinitely. If the authorities do not react by September, he says, parents will be forced to take radical action, which would mean new protests.
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