Milan Knežević (Montenegrin politician)

Milan Knežević Милан Кнежевић
Member of Parliament
Personal details
Born	(1980-03-24) 24 March 1980 Titograd, SFR Yugoslavia (now Podgorica, Montenegro)
Political party	Democratic People's Party (President)
Alma mater	University of Montenegro
Profession	politician and writer

Not to be confused with Milan Knežević (Serbian politician).

Milan Knežević (Serbian Cyrillic: Милан Кнежевић; born 24 March 1980) is a Montenegrin politician and poet who is the founder and current president of the right-wing Democratic People's Party, a member of presidency of the opposition Democratic Front alliance and current Мember of the Parliament of Montenegro as well as the President of the Parliamentary Board for Defence and Security.

Biography

Milan Knežević is a Montenegrin writer and politician. He is the President of the Democratic People’s Party of Montenegro (DPP), a parliamentary party in the Parliament of Montenegro. He was born on 24 March 1980 in Podgorica. He lives and works in his hometown. He completed his primary and secondary school in Podgorica. He graduated in Serbian Language and South Slavic Literature at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Nikšić. He speaks Russian and English.

Literary work

He has been involved in literature since high school, when he started writing poems. He was declared the best young poet in 1997 by Radio Montenegro and the Library "Radosav Ljumović" Podgorica.

He published six collections of poems and the novel "Obala nesanice". He has been awarded many times for his rich literary work.

He published his first collection of poems “Deponija snova“ in 2007, and then: “Avlija bivših” (2011), “Dnevnik sitnih grehova” (2014), “Elektronska identifikacija birača” (2016), “Nijemi dijalozi” (2017) and “Robijaški refreni” (2020).

He published his first novel "Obala nesanice" in 2021. He moved the plot from Montenegro and satirically portrayed the political and social reality of the country where he lives in. The Association of Writers of Serbia awarded him the "Radoje Domanović" award for the most successful satirical novel published in 2021.

He also worked as a theatre director. He is a member of the Association of Writers of Montenegro.

Political career

He founded the Democratic People's Party of Montenegro on 30 November 2014. At the founding assembly, he was elected as the first President.

He got involved in the political life of Montenegro during his student days. Until 2012, he was an active member of the Socialist People's Party (SNP). He was elected as a member of the Parliament of Montenegro for the first time in 2009 when he was only 29 years old. In each subsequent election, he managed to win a parliamentary mandate.

Before the 2012 parliamentary elections, he joined the Democratic Front political alliance. He participated in the elections within this coalition as the "Group of Voters - Milan Knežević". The Democratic Front won 20 parliamentary mandates.

Two years later, on 30 November 2014, the Democratic People's Party (DPP) was formed, whose President he has been since its foundation until today.

The Democratic People's Party was on the list of the Democratic Front in the 2016 parliamentary elections. They won a total of 18 mandates.

MPs from opposition parties started boycotting the Parliament because they believed that the elections were not held in a fair and democratic atmosphere.

After that, the leaders of the Democratic Front, Milan Knežević and Andrija Mandić, were accused of attempting a "coup d'état" on the day of the parliamentary elections on 16 October 2016.

The Democratic Front led a broad coalition in the parliamentary elections on 30 August 2020. The joint list "For the Future of Montenegro" won 27 parliamentary mandates out of the 81 that the Parliament has. With the coalitions "Peace is Our Nation" and "In Black and White", a parliamentary majority was formed, sending the Democratic Party of Socialists with the leader Milo Đukanović into opposition after their rule for thirty years.

Knežević was entrusted with the leadership of the Parliamentary Security and Defence Committee.

In the early parliamentary elections on 11 June 2023, Knežević was the holder of the "For the Future of Montenegro" list, composed of the Democratic People's Party, of which he is the leader and the New Serbian Democracy. The coalition won 13 mandates. He was awarded the fifth consecutive parliamentary mandate.

The"coup d'état"case

An attempted "coup d'état" marked the parliamentary elections on 16 October 2016 On the day of the parliamentary elections on 16 October 2016, several citizens of Serbia were arrested. According to the Special Prosecutor's Office indictment, on the night of the election, it was "planned to break into the Assembly building, and to arrest and kill the then Prime Minister Milo Đukanović”. (?!) In the announcement, it was said that the Russian services were behind the attempted "coup d'état" because the suspects included Russian citizens who were unavailable. The news of the arrests echoed in the world media.

The process of arresting the suspects, the investigation and the indictment was led by the then chief special prosecutor Milivoje Katnić and prosecutor Saša Čađenović, who was arrested in 2022 by order of the Special State Prosecutor's Office on suspicion of the criminal offence of creating a criminal organisation.

In mid-2017, Milan Knežević and Andrija Mandić were suspected of being part of this conspiracy. According to the indictment, in January 2016, they became members of a group formed by Russian agents on the territory of Serbia, Montenegro and Russia, intending to violently overthrow the government in Montenegro. The suspects claimed that the entire process was staged to prohibit the Democratic Front from operating. They identified the then prime minister Milo Đukanović as the inspirer.

The trial in the High Court in Podgorica lasted almost two years. In his final words, Milan Knežević said that neither he nor members of the Democratic Front prepared or participated in a "coup d'état" or the overthrow of the constitutional order of Montenegro.

On 9 May 2019, the Higher Court in Podgorica found Knežević and Mandić "guilty of attempted coup d'état" and sentenced them to five years in prison each. They publicly announced that they did not agree to go to prison. Knežević said that "if something happens to them or their families, the culprits will be Milo Đukanović and his brother Aco Đukanović.".

On 5 February 2021, the Appellate Court of Montenegro annulled the first-instance verdict of the High Court, which sentenced thirteen accused of attempted terrorism, including Knežević, to almost 70 years in prison. In the explanation, it is stated that the panel of the High Court, headed by Judge Suzana Mugoša, "made completely wrong conclusions concerning the evidence that was presented during the trial“.

The "coup d'état" case was returned to the High Court for a retrial before a completely changed judicial panel. The retrial in the High Court in Podgorica was postponed several times. Even after almost seven years, there has been no epilogue to the "coup d'état" process conducted for the alleged attempt to violently overthrow the government of Milo Đukanović.

The final fall of Milo Đukanović's regime was "sealed" by the people in the elections in August 2020. Montenegro changed its government for the first time in democratic elections. Since then, the Democratic Party of Socialists has lost all elections in Montenegro. Their leader Milo Đukanović experienced a debacle in the presidential elections on 2 April 2023. Unaccustomed to defeats, he withdrew from the political scene, resigning from the position of DPS president, which he held for 25 years.

Victim of political persecution by the former regime

Recognised as one of the fiercest critics of the absolutist government in Montenegro, personified by Milo Đukanović and the judicial system, he was often under attack from this autocratic regime. He also received prison sentences and was under house arrest.

Because of the open fight against numerous deviations in society, crime and corruption in the government and positions he expressed publicly, his family members also suffered. His mother was taken into custody in January 2020 because she "obstructed and belittled a police officer" while searching their family home.

The Basic Court in Podgorica sentenced Knežević to seven months in prison in October 2017 on the charge that he physically assaulted a police officer during a protest in front of the Parliament of Montenegro, organised by the Democratic Front, on 17 October 2015. He stayed in the prison in Spuž since 20 March 2018, and after an accepted application for parole, he was released after four months.

He fought a new legal battle in the spring of 2020. The Basic Court sentenced him to house arrest for four months because allegedly, on 15 February 2017, he "insulted and physically attacked deputies of the Democratic Party of Socialists in the hall of the Montenegrin Parliament."

Thus, he went down in history as the only deputy who attended the sessions of the Parliament of Montenegro with an ankle bracelet.

President of the Parliamentary Security Committee

As the Chairperson of the Parilametary Security and Defence Committee, and a member of the National Security Council, he showed a high degree of responsibility and was very active. Responding to current events in the security sector, he scheduled meetings of the Committee with the assessment, that Montenegro's security and socio-political context is dramatic and does not inspire confidence that there is enough capacity for the state to deal with organised crime and cigarettes and drugs smuggling.

Due to the seriousness of the situation in the security sector caused by the arrest of high-ranking police officers on the charge of being collaborators of criminal clans, the Security Committee decided on 13 April 2023 to interrogate the Prime Minister Dritan Abazović, Minister of Internal Affairs Filip Adžić, Chief Special Prosecutor Vladimir Novović, Head of the Special Police Department Predrag Šuković, director of the Police Administration Zoran Brđanin and director of the National Security Agency, Boris Milić.

As a writer, politician and leader of the Democratic People's Party, he perseveres on his honourable path of fighting for the identity of Montenegro, with the respect of all its peoples, as a country for all people of good faith and intention, for the good of Montenegro.