"The owners of the plots possess documentation proving that the Government, or rather the Real Estate Administration of Montenegro, is planning to usurp their private property in favor of the private company Alcazar Energy Partners based in Dubai," state the residents of Nikšić and Šavnik, the owners of the plots, who were supported by the Civic Initiative "Save Brezna".
Owners of hundreds of plots specified in the government's decision warn the Prime Minister Milojko Spajić, minister Slavena Radunovica, Director of the Real Estate Administration, Marko Bulatović, and other involved actors, that they will not allow the state, as they say, to seize their private property for the benefit of Arab companies under the guise of alleged public interest.
They expect a reaction from the Delegation of the European Union to Montenegro and the European Commission because, as they state, this is an unprecedented precedent, an institutional violation of the Constitution, laws and international conventions.
"The controversial government decision was made on December 23 last year without holding a session, while the decision itself states the general formulation "construction of electricity and road infrastructure" as its purpose, without any explanation and without specifying a specific project, route, variant, or even without specifying whether it is electricity or road infrastructure. The Real Estate Administration initiated proceedings and scheduled oral public hearings for the plot owners, without even providing them with complete documentation in the invitations," the statement from the affected plot owners and GI Spasimo Brezna states.
The summonses indicate that the proceedings are being conducted within the framework of a purpose defined "over a period of 30 years", which locals view as an attempt to establish a permanent, blanket regime of restrictions on private property.
GI Spasimo Brezna reminds that the company Alcazar Energy Partners, or rather their Montenegrin subsidiary "Vjetro park Bijela", formally submitted a request to the Ministry of Spatial Planning, Urbanism and State Property in the middle of last year for the declaration of public interest at the construction location and route of the connecting transmission line for their Bijela wind power plant project in Šavnik.
The key evidence, the locals add, that this is not any kind of infrastructure of public interest, but a private project, is found in the documentation on the valuation of the real estate, also prepared at the request of Minister Slaven Radunović, who is also a signatory to the request to the Government to declare it "public interest".
"The report of the Real Estate Administration commission explicitly states that the purpose of the assessment is "incomplete expropriation for the construction of the Bijela wind farm in Šavnik", or "Vjetropark Bijela", and also mentions "the end user of the expropriation (DOO Vjetropark Bijela), whose owner is Alcazar Energy Partners, based in Dubai. When state documents explicitly link the expropriation to a private project, and the Government makes a generic decision without explanation, this raises serious suspicions of abuse of the public interest institute, unlawful influence and corrupt patterns", the locals say.
They also add that the fact is that in numerous activities, acts and actions related to, as they suspect, illegal "support" to private energy companies, the same actors appear - the Ministry of Spatial Planning, Urbanism and State, the Real Estate Administration of Montenegro, the Montenegrin Transmission System (CGES), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and their leaders as signatories of all the disputed acts.
This, they say, points to serious suspicion that this is an organized group and the joint actions of a large number of actors, whose intention is to obtain illegal benefits for legal and natural persons, members of the group, to the detriment of citizens and the state.
"The emissaries of Alcazar Energy Partners pressured us to give up our land and threatened us with expropriation. Now the government, namely the National Land Registry, is formally trying to implement their blackmail and threats of expropriation, at the request of Minister Slaven Radunović," the locals say, adding that they have already initiated legal proceedings in accordance with the law, including filing a criminal complaint with the Special State Prosecutor's Office.
The GI "Save Brezna" reminds that they recently discovered illegal registrations of alleged expropriation in favor of the Montenegrin Electric Transmission System - CGES, and then the registration of easement rights for a transmission line in favor of Alcazar Energy Partners, i.e. Vjetro Park Bijela, on plots in Brezna. The Director of the Real Estate Administration Bulatović refused, as they say, to answer questions and provide documentation, but the records were deleted, also without adequate documentation.
They also recall that the independent mechanism of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), IPAM (Independent Project Accountability Mechanism), accepted their complaint about the planned construction of an international energy hub in the village of Brezna, one of the few villages in Montenegro that is being settled and strongly developed as a tourist destination.
