Over 80 percent of construction is illegal

Last year a by-law was passed making all the illegal facilities legal. It will allow the building of the tourist facilities, restaurants and small residential facilities only

When Our Lady appeared to the startled children on the hot day of June 25th 1981, Međugorje was registered on the map of Bosnia Hercegovina as just a village with about twenty houses. The inhabitants grew only tobacco and grapes for a living. But since then, everything has changed.

Only a year after the death of the autocrat Josip Broz Tito, the political authorities of Communist Yugoslavia tried to play down the apparitions of Our Lady, in a repressive manner. It could be seen in many ways: By the interrogations that the children were subjected to, the prosecution and detaining of priests who stood up to defend the children, to the complete ignoring of Međugorje as shrine of international fame.

They ignored the fact that in one short year after the children first exclaimed that they had seen the ‘Gospa’, more than a million pilgrims passed through Međugorje. The former communist authorities still didn’t issue one single permit for building any sort of facility for accommodating pilgrims. For years, the only refreshment for them was the water from a well. The ignoring of Međugorje and the apparitions lasted all the way up until the regime, due to inner political turmoil, crumbled. Only then did the rigid restraint start to slacken. Five years later, the building of the first small catering facilities and guesthouses were licensed and later some other secondary facilites.

Unapproved construction

Although the priests from Međugorje requested that an Urban Plan be drawn up from the very start, so that the construction of hotels, guest houses, restaurants, souvenir shops, etc. would have some semblance of order, it has not been done yet. Therefore Međugorje has been suffering a long-lasting phase of urban chaos, which came to an end only last year when the by-law was passed by the local district authorities. That is a prohibition was made on construction of any facility lacking the proper urban permit. Unfortunately the resolution came too late as the years when urban chaos prevailed are clearly visible all over the place. This fact is admitted by the representatives of Čitluk Municipality who are the administrative authorities for the shrine of Međugorje.

- The astonishing data that “almost 90 percent of the facilities in Međugorje were built without proper permits” were revealed by the Mayor of the Čitluk Municipality, Mr Ivo Jerkić. It was only in 2006 that Čitluk Municipality came to a decision about making an Urban Plan for the area surrounding the shrine of Međugorje. This was due to the fact that requests to begin construction in the Municipality are still forthcoming in large numbers. There is a particularly large number of requests coming from foreign pilgrims too– the Mayor says.

The full article can be found on pages 36-37 of January 2007 issue.