Inspections prohibit the use of an illegal large floating pontoon on Opatovo, Gugi ignores it

Although the Navigation Safety Inspection of the Kotor Port Authority last week handed it a decision prohibiting the use of a temporary facility - a floating bathing area of ​​250 square meters, the company "Gugi Commerce" from Budva continued to use an illegal large floating pontoon that the company, without obtaining formal permission from the Ministry of Maritime Affairs, installed in the waters of the Tivat Bay, in front of cadastral plots 19/1, 19/2 and 19/3 of the Donja Lastva Municipality, in Opatovo near Tivat.

The pontoon, which is equipped with deckchairs, parasols, and decorative pots with live plants, and on which waiters from the nearby hotel "Ollie's" serve guests crossing the very busy Adriatic Highway near the pedestrian crossing that was recently drawn at the request of the Budva company, is still in full operation and is filled with bathers - primarily hotel guests - throughout the day.

The Ministry of Maritime Affairs stated on this occasion that the inspection will return to the scene and take further measures and actions within its jurisdiction to ensure compliance with the law.

In passing the decision to ban the use of the floating bathing area, the inspection referred to the fact that the floating pontoon installed here by the businessman's company Branislav Gugi Savić, does not possess valid certificates of technical inspection and technical fitness, which, by law, for the use of floating objects at sea, should have been previously issued to him by the Directorate for Technical Standards of the flag state of the Ministry of Maritime Affairs (formerly the Technical Inspectorate of the Maritime Safety Administration) after the inspection of the pontoon.

"The subject of supervision was served with a decision prohibiting the use of the floating facility until its technical inspection and obtaining a certificate of technical correctness, which must be issued by the competent state administration body. Until then, this floating bathing area is essentially closed to users; if the subject of supervision does not comply, the Inspection will take further measures and actions at its disposal against it," an interlocutor from the Ministry of Maritime Affairs told "Vijesti".

"Gugi Commerc" ignored this decision of the Inspectorate, as the company had done before when in May the Inspectorate issued a decision and issued an order to remove 24 large concrete anchor blocks from the seabed, which it had then, again without the consent of the Ministry, placed underwater to secure its future floating beach and other floating facilities at sea.

The company, referring to the Program of Temporary Facilities in the Coastal Zone of the Municipality of Tivat, for the period 2024-2028, installed a floating bathing area in the sea in front of its recently opened new hotel "Ollie's" about twenty days ago, consisting of eight concrete floating pontoons connected together into a single unit, each measuring 12,5 by 2,5 meters. The company did this even though it had not previously obtained the mandatory official permit, i.e. the consent of the Port Authority.

According to the Law on Maritime Navigation Safety, for any construction interventions on the coastline, or the installation of any temporary structures such as pontoons, fish farming cages, buoys and other obstacles in the sea, as well as for any intervention that changes the configuration of the coast and the sea and thus makes it difficult to safely pass, dock and anchor vessels, official consent must be obtained from the locally competent Port Authority, or the Directorate for Navigation Safety.

In this case too, “Gugi Commerc” continues to behave in the same way that the company in Tivat has been doing for years - it does not respect the decisions of the competent state authorities and the orders they issue in the now multiple cases of illegal construction in the sea and on the coast, including the construction of a hotel on Opatovo that is three times larger than permitted, which is why the police filed a criminal complaint against Branislav Savić and his company in February 2024, and in May this year, the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Bar filed an indictment against Savić and Gugi Commerc with the Bar Basic Court on this occasion. Although Savić and Gugu Commerc have so far flagrantly violated the measures prohibiting the performance of work on numerous occasions, failed to act in accordance with the orders received from the competent authorities or violated official seals at the construction site, this has not yet resulted in any serious state procedure against the Budva businessman, who was previously convicted by a final judgment for participation in an organized criminal group that caused multi-million-sector damage to Budva during the DPS government. The latest such case is the controversial "short-cut legalization" of his hotel "Ollie's" in Opatovo.

To date, “Gugi Commerce” has not received formal approval from the Administration for the Protection of Cultural Heritage (UZKD) for the installation of a floating bathing area on Opatovo. The location where Savić's company is intervening on the coast and sea is located in the protective, so-called buffer zone of the protected World Natural and Cultural Heritage Area of ​​the Bay of Kotor, which is under the patronage of UNESCO.

The UZKD told "Vijesti" that this state body "is currently acting on the request of "Gugi Commerce" DOO for the issuance of conservation conditions for the installation of temporary prefabricated and demountable structures for the needs of the arranged bathing area at location 3E, namely two blocks of eight mobile floating pontoons each."

"The procedure established that the location in question is foreseen by the valid Temporary Facilities Program, and that urban planning and technical conditions have been issued for it by the Public Company for the Management of the Maritime Zone of Montenegro. At the same time, the location is located in the immediate area of ​​the protected environment of the Natural and Cultural-Historical Area of ​​Kotor, which is why it is necessary to specifically consider the possible impact of the planned structures on the values ​​of the protected area," said the Director of the Administration Petra Zdravković.

Municipality: We warned the Coastal Zone about the ecological consequences

When asked by "Vijesti" whether and when they expressed their possible disagreement with the installation of a large floating bathing area on Opatovo in the form of a temporary facility in the coastal zone, the Municipality of Tivat said that in May this year, the local administration submitted comments and suggestions to the Public Company for Coastal Zone Management, on the Amendments and Supplements to the Program of Temporary Facilities in the Coastal Zone for the Municipality of Tivat for the period 2024-2028.

"The Municipality pointed out that, in cooperation with the Institute of Marine Biology from Kotor, it conducted a marine biodiversity survey in the period from 2018 to 2025 - including in the area from Opatovo (cat. parcel 759 KO Donja Lastva) to the Church of St. Rok (cat. parcel 502 KO Donja Lastva), to a sea depth of approximately 10 m. It is necessary to take into account the results of this survey, the existing volume of maritime traffic, the overall pressure of intensive construction and high frequency of population and visitors on marine biodiversity, and in this regard, to delete from the document in question newly planned contents that include any construction works, piling, concreting, etc. in the Tivat aquatorium area and changes to the coastline (by filling, construction...)", the Municipality's written statement reads, referring, among other things, to the location of the floating pontoon in Opatovo.