The Stojić family has been waiting for two years to claim disability benefits for their boy, even though the Administrative Court overturned the decision rejecting the request.
The case has been returned to the beginning, and a new decision has not yet been made, while the mother claims that the procedure is being delayed and that the documentation has not been preserved.
The Ministry of Social Welfare denies these allegations and announces a reform of the disability assessment system, while the non-governmental sector warns that families are still waiting for legally guaranteed rights.
The two-year battle with the system is still ongoing. After Televizija Vijesti published a story in December about the Stojić family, whose son Božidar was twice denied disability benefits, the process was brought back to the beginning. Although the Administrative Court overturned the decision of the Ministry of Social Welfare on December 12, Božidar's right has not yet been recognized.
"On the 15th, I went to the social services and the Ministry, where they told me that it was being sent again to the first instance, which already has countless people waiting for over half a year. Of course, they claim that is not true. I said it then, and I can name at least five people who have been waiting for over half a year. On December 15th, they decided that it would be sent to the second instance, but the commissions at the second instance were disbanded. And God knows when it will be. Somewhere at the second instance, which is what I said, well, I guess it will be faster, because somewhere the legal deadline is 40 days. But, here, we see from the previous one that it was not within that legal deadline, because it was sent on August 1st, and we received it on November 4th," Svetlana Stojić, the mother of a boy with developmental disabilities, told Television Vijesti.
Svetlana claims that the documentation about her son was lost at the Ministry, which, she says, was confirmed by several officials. She adds that the court tried unsuccessfully to get a letter from the Ministry during the summer and autumn of last year. On the other hand, the Minister of Social Welfare denies this.
"The documentation was not lost, absolutely not, it was there both during the decision-making process at the first-instance commission and during the decision-making process at the second-instance commission, and ultimately the documentation was submitted to the Administrative Court. The appeal to the Administrative Court was filed back in 2024. It's just that the process is still ongoing," said Minister of Social Welfare Damir Gutić.
Svetlana recalls that she did not file an appeal with the Administrative Court in 2024, but in July 2025, which is confirmed by the number of cases and the dates of the letters mentioned in the judgment. The same decision clearly states that the Ministry, despite the urgency, did not submit the case files, so the court, by law, decided without the documentation that the Minister claims existed and was duly forwarded.
"That information is completely incorrect, because it is information that I received first from the court, so I first went to the social services, and then to the ministry, because at that moment they told the ministry that they did not have the documentation, that they had requested it from the Center for Social Work. And what confirms the story for me that the documentation was lost, because they, we had a second-instance commission on November 5, the move was in September. So they should have had the documentation, not asked the social services," said Stojić.
The Ministry says that a reform of the disability assessment system is underway - the new Law on Unified Expertise provides for the formation of an Institute that will replace the previous commissions. For the first time, a psychologist will also participate in the assessment of the right to disability benefits, which is especially important for children with autism spectrum disorders.
However, the non-governmental association (NGO) "You Are Not Alone", which brings together parents of children with autism, warns that reforms are often slow to take effect, while an increasing number of families are still waiting to exercise their legally guaranteed rights.
"What is good in the law is that there will no longer be I don't know how many tenths of commissions. And there will be no going from one commission to another, but there will be one commission. We'll just have to see. One thing is written and how it is intended to function, and practice will show us tomorrow whether it will really function that way. It starts, it starts in July, so we will see and we will of course monitor to see what will happen with all of this," said Goran Laković from the NGO "You Are Not Alone".
As long as solutions remain in the form of announcements and the commissions are on hiatus until July, families like the Stojićs remain stuck between the law and reality, waiting and fighting for their children to receive what is already theirs by law.
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