Gegaj rebukes Tuzi Municipality

Podgorica, Montenegro -- Saturday, June 27, 2010

Newly appointed Mayor of Tuzi, Nikolle Gegaj, Saturday ordered that the status on the independent municipality of Tuzi needs no discussion at this time because it is not economically feasible to achieve this objective given the urban municipal budget, a message that resonates the exact words spoken by Minority Minister Ferhat Dinosha and Premier Milo Djukanovic in previous months.

"Like serious-minded people, we think that a fully functional municipality is one that is best served under the budget capacity of the capital - Podgorica." Gegaj went on to say that, "when you see that a municipality can operate alone, we [DPS] will be the first to commit to an independent municipality, but to such an extent that it must also operate under direct control of Podgorica, as this is our city."

Such remarks reaffirm Podgorica's mandate to stifle any economic progression in the Malesia region by diverting tax dollars first to the capital city, and then dispersing unproportional amounts back to Tuzi. Evidence of these tactic were made clear during a recent visit to Washington by a Diaspora-led team that, through a published feasibility study overwhelming showed that Tuzi was more economically stable than six existing municipalities in Montenegro.

Commenting on the organization of the referendum decision on 8 August, which approved the previous edition of the Tuzi municipality, Gegaj remarked that such a decision was arbitrary in terms of legal basis, and that "the Statute of the capital is defined by the Capital Assembly, which declares the referendum for all its territory, or parts of it."

Gegaj went on to further assert that, "on the decision of the statutory limits of the municipality, the Urban Municipal Assembly of Tuzi is not competent to issue any decisions on its own, instead these deliberations must take form within the competence of the capital city. Opposition members vehemently rebuked this claim, stating that the rules embedded in the statute disallow and serious decision-making authority by members of the Assembly of Tuzi, and as such all decisions on the welfare of Tuzi over the past four years were made null and void by Podgorica, a heavy-handed tactic that literally makes it impossible to carry out politics tied to economic proliferation.

As in previous campaign promises, Gegaj argued that in the coming four-year mandate the DPS coalition will not abandon the will of the citizens of Tuzi for a municipality - "Our goals are genuine; promises that we gave to the citizens during our election campaign within the coalition of "For a European Tuzi", we will deliver."

But such remarks seem shallow, as Gegaj provided to real plan to achieve municipal status in Malesia that would exhibit economic stability and sustenance. What stands alone in his interview is the persistence that any Tuzi municipality will be established by a pre-determined organization designed in Podgorica, and not one that would fully integrate the needs of the local population.