Director of the Medrese in Tuzi, Mr Fuad Čekić, said “it is high time law on the freedom if religion and position of religious communities in Montenegro was adopted”. Mr Čekić thinks this issue shouldn’t be politicized.
In a statement for CdM, Mr Čekić says that not every law can fully correspond to some religious community.
“The law has some positive solutions but also those who could have been elaborated further. Adoption of the law is the first positive thing. It is high time, there has been a gap for so long, causing chaos inside religious communities”, says Mr Čekić.
Competences of religious communities weren’t defined clearly. According to Mr Čekić, the biggest problem is the fact that, so far, religious communities have been regarded as NGOs.
“This legislative framework will determine legal position of religious communities”, said Mr Čekić.
There’s a great number of religious communities in Montenegro that are registered and act formally, but actually do not exist because they don’t have sufficient number of religious members. Proposal for the law on freedom of religion has regulated this area as well.
Mr Čekić points out that Islamic community in Montenegro has asked for the recognition of the continuity of religious communities.
“Those are the communities that have existed here for centuries, that built this society and the state. The text of the law fails to recognize that. It regulates functioning of religious schools, offers good solutions for registration of religious communities”, explains Mr Čekić.
“What Islamic community asked for with respect to property, was further explanation of the article referring to property, especially paragraph 2 thereof, which refers to the facilities constructed until 1918 using citizens’ funds”, Mr Ćekić pointed out.
Islamic community wanted the agreement to recognize the agreement concluded by the communities.
“Unfortunately, those communities failed to reach compromise in the negotiations. We expected further elaboration on the article referring to exemption from taxes, because we believe it would make the functioning of the state apparatus much easier”, explained Mr Čekić.
In general, the law touched on everything that is relevant to religious communities.
“The law has set legal foundation which will be recognized in other laws. It was high time to address this issue”, concluded Mr Čekić.
Parliamentary discussion on the Proposal for the Law on Freedom of Religion will be held on 24 December.
