Former “Primorka” workers to meet Minister Nišić on Monday over debts and back pay

Former workers of AD “Primorka” will meet on Monday with the Minister of Labor and Social Welfare, Naida Nišić, to talk about debts, unpaid wages, severance pay and years of service, as Vijesti reports. The meeting was mediated by Civic Movement URA MP Zoran Mikić in the Parliament of Montenegro, who arranged it with a phone call after talks with workers’ representatives.

The workers demand urgent payment of back wages and severance, the drafting of individual and summary records of all claims — including unpaid wages, pension and disability insurance contributions, severance pay and claims recognized through court decisions and bankruptcy proceedings — as well as clear identification of those responsible for the unpaid obligations, according to Vijesti’s reporting. They demand that their case “not be treated as an archive file, but as a living issue of human rights and state responsibility.”

According to Vijesti, MP Mikić told the workers they could obtain the same solution as the former workers of “Košuta” — six remaining wages paid from the Labor Fund — while linking years of service remains a more serious problem, but one that can be solved with future legal solutions. He also promised parliamentary questions and a control hearing in parliament on the status of AD “Primorka” workers.

The workers will also prepare, together with their lawyer, a draft law, which they will hand to Democrats MP from Bar, Momčilo Leković, who has promised them he will put it into parliamentary procedure, Vijesti reports. The decision came after they learned that former workers of “Jugoprevoz” from Berane have begun to be paid their debts, following an initiative by Socialist People’s Party MP Bogdan Božović — a case that former worker Danica Kontić described as proof that “a solution exists.”

As Vijesti reports, the workers have protested in recent months in Bar demanding a settlement of their claims, while the Bar Municipal Assembly, on the initiative of councilor Ferida Peročević, unanimously adopted on September 22 conclusions calling on Prime Minister Milojko Spajić and Minister Nišić to receive the former workers’ representatives as soon as possible and respond to their demands.