MANS welcomes the decision of the members of the Parliament who have today at the Parliamentary Committee for Economy, Finance and Budget refused to support a draft decision on long-term lease of the site island Lastavica with fortress “Mamula” allowing the Parliament of Montenegro to make the first step in preventing this, in the public interest hazardous work.
The contract on the lease of the island and fortress “Mamula” which has already been signed between Orascom and the Government of Montenegro, provides to this investor a range of privileges at the expense of the public interest, ranging from the leasing price, benefits in introducing infrastructure, tax relief and finally bypassing the law and regulations relating to the management of the marine zone.
This contract in its content has a lot of similarity to the one that the Government and the municipalities of Bar and Budva have already signed for the site of the Queen’s beach. At the first place that relates to the price of the lease, infrastructure, and management of marine zone, actually on the public access to beaches covered by the lease.
In fact, if the contract is adopted in this form, the state of Montenegro will lease the entire island yearly for less than 48,000 euros, which is far less than the amount that the Costal zone makes from just one beach on the Montenegrin coast.
By comparison, contracted annual lease price of a square meter at this premium location is twice less than the price of DAILY rent of one meter of market stand in Budva. We believe that this is enough evidence of the quality of the contract by the Government on behalf of the citizens signed with the company Orascom. Even when we add to this the fact that on this location certain investments in infrastructure are needed, the yearly price of 1.5 euros per square meter is far below economically justifiable price having in mind the exclusivity of the location.
In addition, the Government by the disputed contract foresee a special regime of access to that part of the coast that is covered by private project of lessee, actually future turistic complexes, which is an arrangement that is practically rewritten from the contract for the Queen’s beach where we had a complete suspension of the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of movement in the Montenegrin territory.
In fact, in the provision in the contract is explicitly stated that access to the Coastal zone is free except for the parts where “access is regulated with immigration laws, foreign trade, free zones, transport or customs, in which access is forbidden for the protection of private facilities or vessels, or based on the lease contract and location study those parts intended to become part of a private project”. This implies that on the island Lastavica there will be parts of the coast that will represent a total ban for citizens, much as it was a plan for a project at Queen’s beach.
I hope that the members of the Parliament which today on the Committee voted against this contract remain consistent in their decision, and will not allow signing of yet another “work of the century” which is to the detriment of citizens.
Dejan Milovac
Director of the Research Center
MANS
