Turbulent political year in Montenegro: A small pond full of crocodiles

With the adoption of the so-called IBAR laws in the middle and the closing of three chapters at the end of the year, citizens Montenegro they got a new hope that they could be residents as early as 2028 Of the European Union.

With the implementation of the Europe now 2 program, the incomes of employees and pensioners have increased, but the dilemma remains whether the reform of the pension system and the reduction of taxes and contributions are fiscally sustainable.

After thirteen years, the State Statistical Office (Monstat) published new results of the population census, writes DW.

At the end of this politically turbulent year, the former friends, Prime Ministers of the Government and the State, Milojko Spajić and Jakov Milatović, buried the hatchet by forming a joint government in Podgorica.

Milatović is returning to the old flock?

Prime Minister Milojko Spajić and head of state Jakov Milatović formally parted ways in February when Milatović left the Europe Now Movement (PES), in whose founding he participated alongside Spajić.

At the same time, there was a split in the Podgorica board of the PES, so part of the board members also left the local parliament and formed the Movement for Podgorica, close to Milatović.

Not long after that, these councilors caused a crisis in the Podgorica government, which led to the holding of extraordinary local elections.

Although they claimed that they would not form a majority with those for whom they left the former government led by the mayor Olivera Injac, and which they called incompetent, Milatović's Movement for Podgorica supported PES, the Democrats and the former parties of the Democratic Front, thus returning to their own ranks.

Milatović's Movement, which participated in the elections with the Citizens' Movement URA, with this move abandoned the partners with whom it appeared before the citizens in the September elections, but also showed that it did not speak honestly with the representatives of the opposition consisting of the DPS, the European Union and the Party of European Progress.

The formation of the government was preceded by a four-hour conversation between Milatović and Spajić, in the Presidency building in Podgorica, far from the public eye. Details are still unknown.

This meeting, unofficially, took place with the mediation of foreign officials who advocated for the "reconciliation" of the two leaders for the sake of the European future of Montenegro.

27 more chapters

At the June Intergovernmental Conference in Brussels, Montenegro officially received the IBAR (Report on the Fulfillment of Interim Criteria in Negotiations with the European Union), and Prime Minister Spajić thanked the EU for its trust and added that this is the moment that Montenegro has been waiting for for two decades.

"We have regained the trust that we lost in the previous period. This is a holiday for Europe and Europeans, because I believe that this expansion is necessary," he said and congratulated the citizens of Montenegro, European partners and countries in the region that helped, especially Croatia and Slovenia.

Just a few days later, at the initiative of the parliamentary majority, primarily the pro-Serbian former Democratic Front (DF), the Montenegrin Parliament adopted the Resolution on Genocide in the Jasenovac, Dachau and Mauthausen camp system, despite announcements that this could damage relations with neighboring Croatia.

"The Republic of Croatia considers it unacceptable, inappropriate and unnecessary to pass a resolution whose intention is not to build a culture of remembrance and reconciliation, but to instrumentalize the memory of the victims of Jasenovac for the short-term political goals of the initiators of this resolution," the Croatian Government announced at the time.

Precisely because of damaged relations, Zagreb blocked the closing of chapter 31 in negotiations with the EU (foreign, security and defense policy), so at the end of December, instead of four, Montenegro closed three negotiation chapters.

The governments before 2020 opened 33 chapters in eight years and temporarily closed three, while the new government, after four and a half years of stagnation, crossed out three as well.

Montenegro still faces a challenge, since the country's leaders announce the closure of all chapters (another 27) by the end of 2026.

Higher wages are a risk for public finances?

In November, employees in Montenegro received increased wages calculated under the Europe Now 2 program.

The minimum wage for those with a high school education is 600 euros, for those with a university education 800 euros, and the salaries of others are increased based on the reduction of contributions for pension and disability insurance at the expense of the employee, an average of five percent.

"Europe now 2 is just the beginning and a flywheel for our economy and the standard of citizens, and we are not stopping here," said Prime Minister Miloko Spajić and announced an increase in the average pension to 600 euros as of January.

This deviates from the pre-election promises and the post-election calculator because there was no increase of 25 percent to all employees who receive a salary over 565 euros.

In the latest forecasts for 2025, the European Commission states that the increase in income due to the increase in the minimum wage and the reduction in pension contributions will support GDP growth in 2025, but will also contribute to an increase in inflation.

The good fiscal results from 2024 were supported by strong revenue growth, but the new measures, which weaken budget revenues and increase expenditures, will lead to a significant increase in the budget deficit, according to the European Commission.

Identity conflicts continue

According to the results of the census conducted by the Montenegrin Administration for Statistics in December of last year, the majority of Montenegrins in Montenegro are 41,12 percent (256.436 citizens), Serbs are 32,93 percent (205.370), and Bosniaks are 9,45 percent (58.956). .

Most citizens speak Serbian - 43,18 percent (269.307), and Montenegrin - 34,52 percent (215.299).

This is the first census after the three-decade rule of the Democratic Party of Socialist Milo Đukanović was replaced, and the first since the pro-Serbian parties of the former Democratic Front came to power.

The results of the census were waited for ten months, but those on language, religion and nation did not change drastically compared to the 2011 census.

Nevertheless, between the two counts, Montenegrins are less by 22.429, and Serbs more by 27.260. Serbian is spoken by 0,3 percent more citizens than 12 years ago, and in the same period the number of citizens whose mother tongue is Montenegrin decreased by two and a half percent.

Montenegro met the end of the year without a budget for the next one because the opposition is blocking the holding of the Assembly sessions because the government retired one judge of the Constitutional Court in violation of the previous rules. The opposition called it a constitutional coup and announced an extra-institutional struggle.

With the demands of the former DF for the adoption of a law on dual citizenship, which would allow a significant number of Serbian citizens to obtain a Montenegrin passport, and the request to declare Serbian the second official language, the next political year in Montenegro will not be boring either.