The Municipality of Mojkovac will not be left without three million euros from the capital budget for the reconstruction of the city market, even though it was established that they provided incorrect information in their application for that money, namely that they had a revised Main Project.
After it was determined that they did not have it and that they had misled the commission, the Ministry of Public Works asked the Ministry of Finance to consider removing the project from the capital budget. Their response suggests that this will not happen.
Concern for the interests of the citizens of Mojkovac prevailed over what the Ministry of Finance calls a "failure" by the Mojkovac administration.
"In accordance with the Decision on the Development of the Capital Budget, the Ministry of Finance will carefully, in partnership with the relevant Ministry of Public Works, consider all circumstances to ensure that the citizens of Mojkovac are not disadvantaged due to shortcomings in the administrative procedures of the Municipality of Mojkovac. The project, as already noted, has met the basic criteria. In further proceedings, the Ministry of Finance will take into account the interests of the local community and will take all necessary steps to ensure that the process is fair, transparent and in accordance with applicable procedures," the government department said.
The issue of the possible removal of the reconstruction of the Mojkovac market from the capital budget was raised last week, after it was determined that the municipality, in its application for a three million euro project, stated that they had a Main Project, and only after the final list of capital projects was concluded did they announce a tender for its development. The mayor said that there may have been an error during the application, and requested that the Ministry of Public Works consider removing the project from the list.
Opposition representatives in the Committee on Economy, Finance and Budget agree that municipalities should be accommodated and enabled to prepare planning documentation for quality projects within a reasonable time, including those that were not included in the capital budget.
"As the opposition, we will ask the community of municipalities which are mature projects with prepared documentation that were not included in the capital budget. If there are any, and my information is that there are, we will request through an amendment that such projects be included in the capital budget in a way that excludes those that were included in the capital budget without documentation," said Nikola Rakočević from the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS).
The Institute Alternative claims that certain projects that were not analyzed or verified were included in the capital budget "at the last minute." The NGO said that eight such projects worth over 400 million euros were included in the budget, which they said appear in the budget year after year but are never implemented. Such projects are pure political marketing and serve to unrealistically pump up the capital budget, according to the Social Democrats.
"I will definitely talk to my colleague Mugoš, who is the chairman of the Committee on Economy, Finance and Budget, to see if these, let's call them capital investments that have been in the budget for years and have not even begun to be implemented, should be removed because it is obvious that they are just taking up space and serving as an advertisement for some good capital budget that is clearly not in practice," said Nikola Zirojević from the Social Democrats (SD).
The government announced that the capital budget for 2026 is the largest ever at 305 million euros. This money should finance a total of 22 capital projects, plus eight more proposed by the Ministry of Public Works.
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