Refusal of the Parliamentary Committee for Justice, Local Self-Government and State Administration to adopt five annual work reports Supreme Public Prosecutor's Office (SPO), from 2020 to 2024, with the explanation that the activities of the public prosecutor's offices were not fully presented, is an obvious sign that the regime wants to dismiss Zagorka Dolovac from the office of the supreme public prosecutor.
The reason for this is that the regime wants to Public Prosecutor's Office for Organized Crime (JTOK) passed under the authority of the VJT in Belgrade. In this way, the authorities want to control important criminal proceedings that are under the jurisdiction of that JTOK, but first it is necessary that Dolovac be dismissed.
That the regime is in a great hurry to dismiss Dolovac, who is a law professor, as soon as possible Vesna Rakić Vodinelić once marked as "the progenitor of the silent clerical order", it can also be seen from the fact that she is the chairman of the Board Ugljesa Mrdic on Sunday afternoon scheduled the meeting already for Monday.
Dolovac did not respond to such a short-term invitation, which further angered the regime, which interpreted her absence from the session as the ultimate act of disrespect.
Komlen Nikolić: Indecent course of the session
The President of the Association of Prosecutors of Serbia, Lidija Komlen Nikolić, assessed for N1 that the course of the Board session was "rude, with disrespect for colleagues sitting across from you."
"The Constitution expressly stipulates that the Supreme Prosecutor is not responsible to the Assembly for proceeding in an individual case. Full stop. What was happening and what they tried to discuss at the session was by the Constitution expressly stated that it cannot be done. "Questions were asked that should not be answered, concerning certain subjects," said Komlen Nikolić.
She sees the session "as a kind of show" and emphasizes that "the failure to adopt the report cannot produce a concrete consequence".
He reminds that the laws on independent bodies such as Protector of Citizens i Commissioner for the Protection of Equality expressly stipulated that their work reports be adopted.
"However, the law on public prosecution explicitly states that the report must be submitted to the Parliament. The Supreme Prosecutor's Office submitted it regularly, delivered it every year, but you have a situation where the Parliament was simply not interested in it," said Komlen Nikolić.
When asked if such a session is preparing the ground for the dismissal of Dolovac, Komlen Nikolić pointed out that the ground for the dismissal of the Supreme Public Prosecutor "is not being prepared in such a way".
"Eventually, according to the procedure, the supreme public prosecutor could be declared responsible for a serious disciplinary offense in the disciplinary proceedings, which would be the reason for dismissal. Then, in the proceedings before the High Council of Prosecutions, which is a second-level body - in which she cannot vote, but neither can the Minister of Justice, which is very important - the proposal for dismissal could eventually go to the Parliament," concluded Komlen Nikolić.
"Very hurt" MP
Dolovac was accused by government representatives in the Judicial Committee that her associates went to the United States in order to receive instructions on how to arrest the President of Serbia. Aleksandar Vučić.
The fact that the Board did not adopt the reports on the work of the prosecutor's office, the pro-regime media synchronously interpreted as a loss of legitimacy for Dolovac.
VJT, on the other hand, in its statement pointed out that such behavior of the Board "is the most serious form of undue influence on the Public Prosecutor's Office, which aims to implement the announced changes in the prosecutor's organization."
"The Supreme Public Prosecutor's Office condemns this action of the presiding MP Mrdić, which represents a malicious attempt to exert severe undue influence on the Supreme Public Prosecutor and the Public Prosecutor's Office as a whole," it was stated, among other things, in the VJT statement.
A prosecutor who does not interfere in her work
The war that is currently raging between the regime and Dolovac is by all accounts reminiscent of a fierce and very emotional quarrel between the recent partners, of whom the physically superior one, and in this case it is the regime, thought that it had become a victim of the infidelity of the weaker partner, which in this case is Dolovac.
Until recently, however, everything was completely different, and anyone watching the couple from the sidelines could conclude that they are a harmonious duo with a bright and secure future ahead of them.
Such an idyllic image was almost entirely due to Dolovac, who for years literally avoided acting in numerous and obvious examples of violations of the law, all because of the inexorable, actually aggressive pressure of a stronger partner, i.e. the regime.
How inconspicuous Dolovac was and how much she did not interfere in her work is also evidenced by the bizarre incident in which she was the victim.
Precisely because the public was wondering where she was and why she was not announcing her numerous violations of the law, a citizen, when he recognized her at the airport, approached her and tried to be funny, asking her: "Are you still alive?".
Because of this, he was sentenced to nine months of house arrest because Dolovac, the Third Basic Court in Belgrade later announced, felt fear and threatened by his behavior. If anything, the curious person got what he was looking for - confirmation that Dolovac was alive, because if she wasn't, she wouldn't even be able to sue him.
Upheaval and "prosecutorial coup d'état"
However, everything changed when Dolovac, due to suspicion of corrupt practices, decided that the case files related to the fall of the canopy should be submitted to JTOK.
This was interpreted by the regime as a "prosecutorial coup d'état" and since then, together with the first prosecutor for organized crime, Mladen Nenadić, targeted by the pro-regime media.
Such a decision was made because the established factual situation indicated a well-founded suspicion that criminal acts were committed that fall under the jurisdiction of the state authorities responsible for organized crime and terrorism.
Just a few days later, Dolovac met with the head of the Delegation at that time Of the European Union in Serbia by Emanuel Giofre. They talked about the prosecutor's cooperation, and many saw in that that Dolovac got a background "from Europe".
The fact that former ministers Tomislav Momirović and Goran Vesić were arrested as part of the investigation into abuses during the reconstruction railway station in Novi Sad and the railways to Kelebija, the pro-regime media therefore labeled it as a "prosecutorial coup d'état" carried out on "the order of the Europeans".
Vucic's insults and Mrdic's hunger strike
In the meantime, JTOK, in addition to the case of the fall of the canopy, also started the pre-investigation procedure in the case of the General Staff, and in that procedure, evidence was collected about the suspicion that certain ministers "abused their position to the detriment of all citizens".
The fact that JTOK started to do its work angered Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić so much that he declared on a national television that most prosecutors in Serbia are a "corrupt gang" and that TOK prosecutors are "criminals".
The peak of the campaign against Dolovac, which resulted in the aforementioned scandalous session of the Parliamentary Committee for Justice, Local Self-Government and State Administration, was reached when the mentioned chairman of that committee, Uglješa Mrdić, decided to start a hunger strike.
Initially, Mrdić started the hunger strike with the demand that the former president of the Shareholders' Assembly of the Serbian Railway Infrastructure, Nebojša Bojović, and the former executive director of that company, Milutin Milošević, be arrested "because of their responsibility for the fall of the canopy".
However, in a statement to the pro-regime media after ending his hunger strike, Mrdić stated the real reasons why he decided to take such a drastic step.
"I will seek to change the set of judicial laws, I will fight in a political way in the parliament, so as not to force my fight for truth and justice to the end. Serbia needs a reorganization of both the prosecutor's office and the judiciary, and we must return the hijacked prosecutor's office to the control of the state. The prosecutor's office and part of the judiciary that was stolen from the state should be returned to the control of the Serbian state in accordance with the Constitution of the Republic of Serbia," said Mrdić at the time.
Two weeks after that statement, Mrdić, according to what could be heard and seen at the mentioned session of the Committee, began the "fight for the reorganization of the prosecution and the judiciary" with an open showdown with Zagorka Dolovac.
