Million-Euro Scandal or Just Bad Weather?
The renovation of the Mateševo-Kolašin road, connecting the highway with Kolašin towards Bijelo Polje, cost nearly 7.4 million euros. But wait – the contractor, Bemax, received almost a million euros more than originally agreed. Is this a mistake or a deliberate cash grab from the state budget?
How did the cost increase happen?
The contract with Bemax was signed in early October with an eight-month deadline. Even though the work hadn’t started, Bemax received an advance of several hundred thousand euros. Two months later, in December, they got another advance based on an extraordinary government decision, even though the company had no liquidity problems.
The work only began at the end of April the following year, and by the end of that year, when the job was supposed to be finished, an annex to the contract was signed increasing the price by about a million euros and extending the deadline. The reasons cited were “extremely bad weather” and “unforeseen circumstances” such as fires, floods, and earthquakes.
Are weather conditions the real reason?
Project changes and deadline extensions are regularly used by the traffic administration to justify million-euro contract increases. But is this just a practice or a scheme to siphon off extra millions from the state budget? The NGO Action for Social Justice (ASP) suspects that this is exactly what’s going on.
What do the authorities say?
It’s unknown whether anyone from the traffic administration or ministry has questioned the responsibility for poor projects on which tenders are based. The renovated road was officially opened 17 months after the contract signing, far beyond the original deadline.
A broader picture of corruption?
This case is not unique. Many capital investments in Montenegro show similar patterns – million-euro contract increases, project changes, and deadline extensions. Isn’t it time someone finally put a stop to this?
Conclusion
While citizens pay the price, money from the state budget ends up in the pockets of companies like Bemax. Is this due to poor planning, corruption, or a mix of both? We’ll leave that for you to decide.
If you managed to follow this labyrinthine story without getting dizzy, drop a comment below – maybe together we’ll uncover more secrets behind these million-euro deals! Or just share a good joke about the “extremely bad weather” that costs millions.
