#1 – Time Out Croatia

We provided numerous pictures to Time Out Croatia for their current magazine issue, in exchange for our contact details being published, and they chose one. But imagine our shock when we opened the new issue to see that they had put our picture (seen above), uncredited as well, right next to a paragraph of text extolling our competitors, Adriatic Kayak Tours.

The saga continues…

#2 – Arista Nautica

The leut, Labud, is finished and ready to be launched. But she still sits in the shed at the Arista Nautica yards in Vranjic.

Why? Because two personal friends of David Hicks (one of the yard’s owners), Tim Jarman and Giles Weston, were doing the wrong thing by us business-wise – so we told them to pull their heads in or we would go to the police. The cowards got worried – as they are unregistered to live in Croatia – and ran to David. He demanded we pay $US20,000 before we can remove our boat from the shed. This was done in the hope we would be scared and leave his friends alone.

We told him to keep the boat and that we will see him and Don Marshall (the other owner) in the criminal and civil courts. There are no contracts between us and I have done in the last 12 months three design projects for David and Don and not asked for a cent.

The saga continues…

#3 – Motovun Elections

Local elections were held across Croatia on May 17. We made the pilgrimage in Motovun to vote. Our friend, Ranko Bon (seen below kissing the obligatory baby (Roklan)), was standing as a candidate for the Green Party in coalition with the Social Democrats. His candidacy was part of a continuing campaign to sustainably improve Motovun (and stop the proposed Jupiter Adria golf development).

The results were not as we had hoped. Firstly, the current mayor and IDS candidate, Slobodan Vugrinec, was returned. Secondly, Ranko didn’t earn a position on the town council.

Across Croatia there was a movement away from the center-right parties (HDZ and IDS) but the center-left party (SDP) didn’t pick up the vote – secondary parties and independents did. So in Motovun it wasn’t all bad news – IDS lost 3 seats (from 9 down to 6), SDP/Greens also lost a seat (from 4 to 3 (Ranko was 4th on their list)) and a new independent party got 4 seats. These Motovun independents, before the election, had voiced their concerns about the golf development – so we have to wait and see.

Mayor Vugrinec has already thrown a tantrum, stating he no longer wants the position if he doesn’t have an absolute majority in the town council!

The saga continues…

( In Split, after earning over 45% of the initial vote, Kerum will be in a run-off this weekend – which he is likely to win – and become our next mayor.)

On the telephone today I asked Ranko Bon to provide a short update in regards to Jupiter Adria’s golf course resort proposal in the valley below Motovun. He did more than that – and wrote a full account of recent events there, including local press reaction, on his Residua Blog.

Last June we mentioned (here) a March decision by a commission setup jointly by the Minister of the Environment and the Minister of Culture to vet Jupiter Adria’s proposal. The commission requested that the number of beds in the accommodation around the course be halved (from 600 to 300).

Jupiter Adria refused to swallow this decision – and so the ‘behind-the-scenes’ pressure began.

Firstly, the Ministry of Culture was seemingly side-lined. Golf courses today don’t have the environmental impact they once did – new grass species have reduced the water and chemicals required for their maintenance – and the same can be said for the resort development surrounding. But convincing the Ministry of Culture that a development of the size planned was not going to affect Motovun in more subjective ways, such as hurting the truffle gathering or have a dramatic visual impact, was going to be too difficult for the pro-Jupiter Adria camp.

Secondly, the Mayor of Motovun, Slobodan Vugrinec, in October turned the simple administrative process of the public discussion of the environmental impact study into a pro-resort political rally packed with supporters to try to impress the local media.

Thirdly, the makeup of the commission was changed. As mentioned in Ranko’s piece, the president of the commission, Dr Velimir Simicic, was fired, and replaced, by the Minister for the Environment Marina Matulovic-Dropulic, with a petty bureaucrat. Dr Simicic, far from being a rabid, tree-hugging, anti-development ‘greenie’, is well known for his pro-golf stance (writing a 1995 golf and tourism piece) but was against this particular development.

Lastly, strangely, other commission members began to change their minds.

So on January 29 it was announced that the commission passed the proposal, although 3 out of 9 members were still opposed to it.

One of the 3 members in opposition was Zlatan Juras. He is also not a ‘pinko’, sandal-wearing lentil-eater. He is Croatia’s first international golf referee, a past member of the national team (Captain at previous European and World Championships), the founder and first president of the Committee for the Rules and Amateur Status of the Croatian Golf Federation, and the chief editor of the Croatian golf magazines Golf World, Golf Magazine and Crogolf.com. If anyone in the whole world would support a golf course in Croatia it would him – but no! – he opposes Jupiter Adria’s unsustainable proposal!

On March 26 the Minister for the Environment announced that it was ratifying the commissions decision. Jupiter Adria is now one step closer to starting the bull-dozers.

Recently other cases have shown that the Motovun result is not unique in Croatia but rather a symptom of weak governance where officials can either be easily convinced of the benefits of such-and-such proposal, easily be bullied by EU officials or simply bought off with foreign money. Rockwool, an EU insulation company, recently commissioned a polluting factory in Istria that received generous tax and environmental breaks; local environmental inspectors were warned by Zagreb to stay away from a Polish-owned metal recycling plant in Split, which has been spewing noxious gases daily. An asbestos factory (Salonit) in Split and two cement works in Istria, which burnt toxic Italian waste as fuel, have only just closed.

As Croatia rushes to join the EU it is also fast becoming its Mexico!

Last week the Sabor (Croatian Parliament) passed legislation dealing with golf course developments.

Currently it is very difficult to organize a large parcel of land in Croatia for a golf resort as the country is divided into numerous small plots, many of which are owned by numerous owners, who may also be dead or living overseas. The newly passed law is a heavy-handed attempt to break this impasse.

The new law allows the government to use ‘eminent domain’ to confiscate land from its owners if a golf course resort is proposed nearby and the land is required for the development, even if the owners don’t wish to sell. There is no right of appeal.

The HDZ-controlled government, with Premier Ivo Sanader, is desperate to stimulate the Croatian economy and is hoping for a golf-led recovery; it is under pressure to create jobs, as the EU is forcing them to privatize the bankrupt state-owned ship-building industry, and they are struggling for ideas. The problem with Croatia as a golf tourism destination is that its climate isn’t conducive to a long golfing season, and it doesn’t have a golf-playing local population; its foolish to base a future economic plan on building these resorts.

The situation smacks of overt corruption – several golf developers have given sizable donations to HDZ and a local Istrian law firm, who has a number of large golf developers as clients, had a hand in drafting the legislation.

It seems that there is now no way to prevent Jupiter Adria from building its resort below Motovun. The advice from a government-convened committee has been ignored by the Environment and Culture Ministries and all other methods of blocking it have been circumvented, so its construction will go ahead.

This new law is another example of people’s basic rights being eroded in Croatia. Recently free speech has being attacked with the arrest of a Facebook user critical of the government, and several civil cases being brought against anti-corruption bloggers, including Ranko Bon (here and here), our friend in Motovun. Ranko is being sued by Motovun’s Mayor, Slobodan Vugrinec, for his scribblings, and the law firm representing the Mayor is same that advised the Government on the newly passed golf legislation!

Other political problems for Premier Sanader include assassinations in Zagreb of anti-organized crime reporters and a well-connected lawyer, and Slovenia blocking Croatia’s ascension to the EU.

Things are progressing at our house in Motovun. The structure for the floors has been put in, the roof replaced and the rendering of the facade has begun. We hope it can be ready for use in October.

In March, a commission setup by the Ministry of the Environment and the Ministry of Culture set a limit on the number of beds for the Jupiter Group-proposed golf course/development below Motovun. This followed a previous Enviromental Impact Report which came to a similar conclusion. Yet are developers continuing to lobby behind the scenes with direct talks with the Ministers to have these recommendations overturned. And the current indication is that they appear to be succeeding. So, this development has failed government-organized tests twice and yet Jupiter still tries to ‘back-door’ this project using ‘old fashioned’ methods used to influence officials prevalent in a country such as Croatia. There has already been a previous incident regarding this project that the courts deemed illegal. We will have to wait and see.

We bought a house in the beautiful hill-top town of Motovun a year ago. The plan is to begin renovation in early-2008.

For us, the valleys around Motovun are one of the few areas that have not yet suffered from bad development in Croatia. That is why we were upset to hear that an English development company is seeking permission to build a golf resort just a stone’s throw from the town.

We are not against all golf courses – it’s their location and the inappropriate housing development around them that are the main issues.

A resort near Groznjan will begin construction soon – it will reuse abandoned houses for its accommodation – sounds like an excellent idea.

But, the proposed new Motovun resort will include a 600-bed large scale development just across the valley. Motovun has a permanent population of 300. What will be the visual impact?

And, Motovun has become famous for its truffles – what will happen to them when the chemicals used on the courses enter the ground water? Spain is now dealing with the problems of an over-supply of golf courses and their resorts taxing local water supplies.

Of course the developers have discovered that greasing the palms of local politicians helps when dealing with annoying issues such as environment studies.

Please go to Motovun Eco Town and sign up if interested.