By The Trade Union of Media of Montenegro (TUMM) welcomes the repeated ruling of the Basic Court in Podgorica, which once again confirmed that the management of RTV Podgorica unlawfully dismissed the president of the trade union organisation at that media outlet, Milan Nikčević.
We recall that in April 2025, the same court already ruled that Nikčević had been unlawfully dismissed. This was followed by proceedings before the High Court, which returned the case for retrial with instructions to present additional evidence. In the latest repeated proceedings, Basic Court judge Boško Bašović upheld his original decision, further confirming that Nikčević has been unlawfully out of work for more than a year.
We believe that the repeated identical ruling, even after the presentation of additional evidence, clearly indicates that the dismissal was not only unlawful, but also unfounded and aimed at removing a trade union representative of RTV Podgorica employees.
Under the latest ruling, this local public broadcaster is obliged to reinstate Nikčević within eight days of the judgment becoming final, and to reimburse him for the costs of the court proceedings.
Nikčević filed a lawsuit against his former employer after being dismissed in March 2025 for “abuse of position or exceeding authority,” namely for refuelling his private vehicle at the expense of RTV Podgorica, with the verbal approval of the company’s director, Vladimir Otašević, who later claimed he did not recall giving such approval. Nikčević had requested this right in order to commute between Nikšić and Podgorica, for a fixed amount of 100 litres per month, and regularly submitted signed fiscal receipts to the finance department.
As the court had already established a year earlier, this demonstrated that Nikčević had no intent to commit wrongdoing and that his employer was aware of the fuel usage.
As reiterated in the latest ruling, the proceedings established that Nikčević’s conduct was transparent and not aimed at obtaining unlawful gain. Supporting this, the court noted that he always refuelled the same amount, signed receipts on a monthly basis, personally submitted them to the employer’s finance department, and that this practice continued throughout 2024 and 2025 until the termination of his employment.
TUMM once again points out that Nikčević, a father of three minor children, has been without income for more than a year and unable to support his family.
Any further delay in enforcing the ruling would constitute a direct violation of his fundamental labour and trade union rights, as well as his livelihood. We therefore expect the competent authorities to ensure the prompt enforcement of this judgment and to put an end to the, unfortunately increasingly frequent, practice of unlawfully targeting trade union representatives.
