If the expropriation procedure in the municipality of Leposavic continues without specifications as to what is being built and talks of infamous infrastructure projects carry on, preliminary decisions should be rejected in court, legal expert Dragutin Nenezic assessed in a KoSSev portal podcast. Nenezic noted that Pristina does not respect legal procedure, and that „all of it was turned upside down.“ Furthermore, he assessed that everything that has been carried out so far is „equal parts problematic and scandalous“.
On the other hand, if the court does not overturn the preliminary decision, and a final decision is made, Nenezic warns of a „dismemberment of the north of Kosovo“ with new bases and checkpoints, as the lives of the locals „become unbearable“ to the extent that everyone will decide to leave.
„In a perfect world,“ he argued, the works would be stopped, everything would be demolished and special and other units would withdraw, leaving people to „live and work in peace“. This legal expert, however, doesn’t believe that this is likely to happen but expresses hope that pressure from international actors will lead to a temporary suspension of the works.
The KoSSev portal spoke to Nenezic the day after a public discussion was held in Leposavic earlier this week on the expropriation of land in this municipality.
Nenezic participated in the discussion as a representative of one of the residents of Lesak affected by the expropriation, thus joining the local legal team representing the residents of this village and the village of Dren.
Public discussions are long overdue, as is everything else in this procedure, Nenezic explained.
„A public discussion should have been held first. After a public discussion, decisions (of the Kosovo government) should have been made, and then we would have a whole sequence of events – a decision on determining the public interest, further consideration, preliminary, final decision, and only then expropriation is carried out, and then construction,“ says Nenezic.
„According to the law, everything that is built constitutes illegal construction. But that doesn’t stop them from building. It only exposes the character of the system – police and an attempted military mono-ethnic dictatorship, and the people affected by the expropriation will have to suffer until this lawlessness is unseated in some way“
Depending on the project itself, preliminary actions may be carried out on land that has yet to be expropriated, which is how Pristina justifies the works started in January in the villages of Dren and Lesak, which were then suspended – he added.
„At the same time, depending on the type of facility, an environmental impact assessment should be carried out for the largest number of infrastructure projects. Everything was done upside down here, construction started first, expropriation decisions were made later, without a public discussion, and public discussions were subsequently scheduled, due to the pressure of the international factor. Everything is upside down.”
He assessed that each of these mistakes is „equal parts problematic and scandalous.“
„Either the people who are doing this do not know their own law, or they implement it poorly, or they are not at all interested in respecting it… and maybe all of that combined,“ Nenezic said.
According to him, the representatives of the Kosovo government „kept talking in circles and went on and on about a procedure without substance“ during the public debate held in Leposavic.
He underlined that they even failed to answer the question as to what kind of project of public importance is being undertaken on expropriated land, although the police previously confirmed that a border police base is under construction.
„They are really messing things up and they aren’t doing anything right. None of our questions into the reason why a base will be situated there were accompanied by an appropriate answer,“ he stated.
Nenezic is also set to participate in the public discussion scheduled for February 21st in Zubin Potok.
While noting that police bases have already been built in this municipality, he assessed that it is „foolish“ for Pristina officials to continue in the same manner.
„If they had mulled it over at all, they would have canceled the discussion in Zubin Potok and suspended all construction. Unfortunately, I don’t think that a rational approach is anywhere to be found when it comes to the current government in Pristina.“
Nenezic expressed hope that the Kosovo government would not take on the same approach as it did in Leposavic:
„This would show that we are dealing with very reasonable people. It can’t be the same. You can’t talk about any kind of infrastructure when you’ve built a base that everyone can see, everyone knows about it.“
On the other hand, he also “hopes” that their approach remains the same, because „it would show the absurdity of the situation we are in“.
Nenezic notes that the whole procedure reminds him of an Anglo-Saxon doctrine of expropriation without compensation:
„That for the purposes of public security, military, and police bases, expropriation is carried out without compensation and without some things that go along with it. It seems to me that someone gave bad advice to Pristina to carry out some preparatory works for some future bases based on that doctrine,“ Nenezic said.
Nenezic states that a preliminary decision on expropriation should be made after public discussions in Leposavic and Zubin Potok.
It can be overturned in court, he added.
„If the expropriation procedure in the municipality of Leposavic is continued without specifying what exactly is being built, and talks of infamous infrastructure projects carry on, preliminary decisions should be rejected in court,“ he said.
If this does not happen, then after the preliminary, a final decision is made, which brings the expropriation to an end.
Nenezic stated that this would mean that anything is possible, and thus the „dismemberment“ of the north of Kosovo would continue.
„If everything goes the way they intend it to go now, anything is possible. I think that they will literally physically tear the north of Kosovo into pieces, cover it with their checkpoints, bases, and alternative routes that they can use in the event of some new barricades, and make people’s lives so unbearable that they will all decide to leave,“ he said.
„In a perfect world,“ he argued, the works would be stopped, everything would be demolished and special and other units would withdraw, leaving people to „live and work in peace“.
However, he doesn’t believe that this is likely to happen but expresses hope that the pressure from international representatives will lead to a temporary suspension of the works.
„I do not believe that they will withdraw, it would be a big defeat for them politically. Unfortunately, I don’t think that will happen, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they stop if nothing else is done until some further political agreement is reached,“ said Nenezic.
Expropriation for the Ski Center Brezovica: What was being built was known from the beginning
Nenezic also participated in the procedure of land expropriation in Strpce, i.e. for the needs of the Ski Center Brezovica.
He revealed that this procedure was completely different from the one conducted in the north, starting from the fact that in the case of Brezovica, it was known from the very beginning for what purposes the land was being expropriated.
„A concession procedure was initiated in which the municipality directly participated. In the tender commission, they had their own representative – the president of the municipality, who had the right of veto. From the very beginning, consultations were held with the local community – both during the adoption of that master plan and during the concession, as well as expropriation. The expropriations came at the end,“ said Nenezic.
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