Since 2006, Montenegro has been a growing tourist destination, the Minister Gvozdenovic said noting that the competition in the Mediterranean was increased and that we had to fight for every investor, the Radio Antena M carried.
Mr Gvozdenovic pointed out that a great opportunity had been missed last week when the Parliament had failed to adopt the Annex to the Contract on the Queen’s beach and Mamula.
“We must not repeat the mistakes of the previous week. We missed our chance to have a new high-quality tourist offer in the coming years. It is crucial not to lose trust of investors because it is not easy to attract them,” the Minister said.
Mr Gvozdenovic added that the Ministry and the Government had done everything in order for the projects to be implemented, and that he could not be held responsible because they had not passed in the Parliament. He believed that the culprit was their coalition partner, first of all, their president.
“I am sure that the direct culprit is the SDP and the Speaker of the Parliament. We had the support at one point. What happened then is a matter of a short-term politics,” he said.
Mr Gvozdenovic added that “political inaction represented a safe haven for certain individuals but it was fatal for Montenegro”.
“The one who is afraid to make decisions, has no business being in the Government”, he said.
Mr Gvozdenovic expected support because he believes those projects are in the interests of tourism and development of Montenegro. When it comes to Mamula, the Minister hopes that the investor will wait the item to come again to the agenda of the Parliament. As he pointed out, the Government did not give up these projects.
“We expect that we will quickly adopt these solutions,” he stressed.
Asked whether he would submit the same document into the parliamentary procedure, Mr Gvozdenovic said that for the time being they had noticed no elements which would require amending.
Mr Gvozdenovic commented on the investments at the press conference where the current results of the tourism season were presented. He emphasised that a continuous growth in terms of revenues, number of tourists and overnight stays were recorded during the season.
“Revenues for the first six months were increased 10%. We can say that we have a successful tourism season,” he said.
Since the beginning of the year, Montenegro was visited by 390,000 tourists, almost 14% more than last year. In the first six months there were 1,974,000 overnights, or 14% more compared to the same period last year.
