• srijeda, 23 jul 2025

Traffic: Trade union and Ministry seem to e talking at cross-purposes

Traffic: Trade union and Ministry seem to e talking at cross-purposes
Trade Union of highway traffic has formed today a working group that is to be in charge of reconciling and uniting draft of their Regulation on public transport of passengers on established routes with the Regulation of competent ministry on traffic control till Tuesday. After that they will propose it to the Government. "In case the working group that will include representatives of the trade Union, Chamber of Commerce, Ministry of traffic, internal affairs and financial police did not succeed in uniting and reconciling these proposals we shall ask from the trade union organizations to state their attitude on organization of general strike", said president of the trade union of highway traffic Miodrag Bualtovic. At the last session held two weeks ago the trade union proposed a special regulation or other sub legal act to be established for defining kinds of vehicles that could be used for transport of passengers in local and suburban routes. They estimated that it was necessary to exclude station-wagon-taxi vehicles from this sphere of transport. Ministry of maritime and traffic prepared a new draft of Regulation on joint control of inspection services and it also coordinated the campaign on stopping the illegal transport in Podgorica during the last two weeks. Representatives of traffic firms said that those two proposals of sub-legal acts related to completely different spheres, and it caused their dissatisfaction by engagement of Ministry of traffic and maritime in resolving the problem of illegal transport. "We asked regulation to clearly define kind of vehicle that can be used for transport of passengers on city, suburb and inter-city routes and Ministry is proposing joint control of traffic", was said at the session. According to Law on highway traffic and by municipal acts, public transport of passengers on established routes can be realized only by buses, that is by vehicles that have at least nine seats. Transporters demanded number f seats in vehicle that participated in public transport on established routes not to less then 20 estimating that such regulation was being applied everywhere in Europe. Minster of maritime and traffic assistant Milovan Djurickovic said the draft of the regulation on conducting the joint control of traffic was precisely stating the time and municipality where it would be conducted and it also defined responsibilities of this ministry for the quality of control. According to him this sub-legal act would contribute to more harmonic functioning of all the services involved in stopping the gray economy in the sphere of traffic. Secretary for traffic of municipality of Podgorica Momir Skopelja said that during last two weeks 28 vehicles were temporarily taken away thanks to special engagement of municipal inspections and traffic police but also thanks to higher fees for making violations. Number of illegal transporters in Podgorica is less then 15 days ago while there is every day more and more passengers on bus stations", said Skopelja. Representatives of Public transport firm and private firm "Minic" did not agree to this claim of secretary for traffic estimating that the situation was worse then before since number of passengers in their busses was reduced. Members of trade union concluded that their cooperation with the ministry of interior affairs in stopping the illegal transport of passengers was good and they accused the employed in Ministry of maritime and traffic and Secretariat for traffic of Podgorica of having material benefits from gray economy. "People from competent ministry and Secretariat for traffic of Podgorica have station wagons by which they realize taxi-transport of passengers on city and suburb routes so it is not in their interest this problem to be eliminated", said owner of the firm "Minic" Nikola Minic. He added that legal transporters did not ask for canceling of station wagon taxis but only for possibility their vehicles to transport passengers on city, suburb and inter-city routes.