„We are witnessing a charade in which not even the first step has been taken yet“ said the editor-in-chief of the KoSSev portal while assessing yesterday’s rejection of the request for a petition to recall the mayor by the chairman of the North Mitrovica Municipal Assembly.
The request for the recall of the mayor, which was submitted by a group of citizens last week in the North Mitrovica municipal building, was rejected by the chairman of the assembly of this municipality, Nedžad Ugljanin, as he confirmed for KoSSev.
On the other hand, he emphasized that they will be „registered“ as soon as today, if this group of citizens, along with the already submitted form, submits a separate request on the „formation of an initiative group“ and „a request that the CEC register them“.
„At the very least, both sides are not managing well in interpreting the administrative instruction, although I think that there is a much more complex story behind it,“ Tatjana Lazarević told N1.
In her interpretation of the situation, there is a clear lack of goodwill on the part of the Pristina authorities to start the election process in the north – as reflected in the fact that the elections were held in April this year, despite the boycott.
„After mayors were literally installed in municipal buildings despite firm recommendations, and even pressure, from the international community not to do so and raise tensions,“ she stressed.
Lazarević added that the Albanian mayors were installed in the north with the presence of special forces, adding that the lack of goodwill of the central authorities became even more obvious when the issue of repeating the electoral process was raised.
She highlighted that: „The fact that the Kosovo officials, led by the Kosovo Prime Minister, kept repeating that the mayors’ resignations are out of the question, although he also agreed that the full legitimacy of their management is questionable.“ She mused that this was the technically easiest way to „solve the whole mess“.
The KoSSev editor listed another example of the absence of goodwill:
„Finally, the Serbian side understood this, regardless of the fact that this (cf. request) is supposedly being submitted by free citizens, which, to tell you honestly, I doubt it. I believe it is clear that this impulse had to come from some governing structures on the Serbian side. So, now that the Serbian side succumbed and gave in and agreed to take the more difficult path and submit an initiative for the recall of the mayor – which is somewhat questionable legally, requires a lot of time, and can further burden the relations between Belgrade and Pristina.“
She explained that although the Administrative Instruction may contain some ambiguities and inaccuracies, the fact that the two parties could not find their way in it would not be „terrible“ if both sides demonstrated goodwill.
„If we ignore the fact that there is a higher political agenda, it is obvious that the parties do not manage well when it comes to the interpretation of the new administrative instruction, which is also not terrible, but if there was the goodwill of the parties, then everyone would try, even with vagueness and inaccuracy – and such obstacles could be easily prevented,“ says Lazarević.
She pointed to the fact that the opposite situation was at hand.
„If the morning shows the day, the way in which this entire process is conducted, from the position of the group of citizens who submitted the initiative and what they experienced the first time when they failed to submit the request, one could sense that we would witness something that, unfortunately, looks like a dirty game.”
The editor of KoSSev disagreed with the factual basis of the chairman’s explanation for rejecting the request of the three-member group of citizens.
According to her, the required information, which Ugljanin stated was not delivered, was already presented in a filled-in form that he himself accepted from the initiators in the hall of the Municipal Assembly: from the formulation of the request, explanation, and presentation of the initial group of citizens.
She also reminded of the article that the chairman himself refers to in his explanation for rejecting the request (5.3), which does not actually provide for the possibility that citizens may not register an initiative group for starting a petition, either through him or through the CEC.
On the other hand, Lazarević agrees with Ugljanin’s earlier remark that in the second part of the explanation of the request, the initiators presented one factually unfounded statement, namely that the municipality of North Mitrovica is not functioning.
„The municipality is working at full steam. The fact that it does not represent the interests of the majority of citizens and lacks democratic legitimacy is also a fact, but that does not prevent the municipality and its officials and employees from working at full steam. I have repeatedly emphasized that they make various decisions, implement a large number of actions and that we cannot say that the municipality is not functioning,“ she said.
However, Lazarević recalled that in the most recent decision not to accept the request, Ugljanin did not refer to that explanation, but to the technical absence of information attached to the request.
She reveals that when she asked Ugljanin why he did not reveal his disagreement publicly, he replied that he did not want to do so, instead, he consulted with the ministry and legal teams for the reasons for not accepting the request.
The editor of KoSSev, on the other hand, blames the Serbian side, in addition to the lack of authenticity, for not preemptively avoiding the reluctance of the Kosovo authorities by not leaving them room for different interpretations of the administrative instructions.
„If I were to fully believe in the spontaneity of the actions of the citizens in the North that they, magically, on their own initiative, three citizens each in four municipalities in the North simultaneously decided to submit this request. And that in that sense they are not familiar with the law, they did not consult anyone, and this request of theirs did not successfully prevent all the potential weak points due to which their request would be rejected. However, considering that I believe that it is an orchestrated action, about support from the ruling structures to push certain citizens to submit an initiative, what I do not understand is why those same governing structures did not prepare them and thus prevent the rejection in advance due to the lack of will from Pristina. In such circumstances, if it is necessary for the request to be 100% filled out, it should be 200% perfect and as such, it does not leave any possibility for it to be rejected.“
Lazarević warned that an exhausting time is yet to come.
„If we have already started the first phase of the application of the administrative instructions for launching the initiative for new elections in such a difficult category in which the parties outsmart each other with incoherent interpretations in the application of the rules, and the special responsibility lies with Pristina, imagine what will happen when we cross that first obstacle in which will finally accept the request and start with the second exhausting phase of launching the petition and its acceptance by Pristina,“ she said in an interview with „Dan Uživo“ on TV N1.
Read more:
Ugljanin rejects residents’ request to recall the mayor, seeks an additional document
An Initiative to recall mayor submitted in Leposavic as well; Radović: No party support
An initiative to replace the mayor submitted in Zubin Potok as wellA group of N.Mitrovica citizens officially submitted an initiative for the removal of the mayor, The MA chairman has five days to respond to it
Will petitions lead to new local elections in the north?
Preuzimanje i objavljivanje tekstova sa portala KoSSev nije dozvoljeno bez navođenja izvora. Hvala na poštovanju etike novinarske profesije.
