Kičevo: school transport cost 42 million denars in 2024 and 21 million in 2025 - who was paying double?

The mayor of Kičevo, Aleksandar Jovanovski, has presented a report on his first ten or so months in office, which he took over in November 2025. The report is long, but it contains one figure worth more than the whole press conference.

School transport: from 42 million denars in 2024 to 21 million in 2025

According to Jovanovski, the municipality paid 42 million denars for school transport in 2024, 21 million in 2025, and in 2026, up to the period covered by the report, 7,120,000 denars. If children are still being driven to school and the cost has halved in a year, then the question isn't how much the new mayor has saved. The question is who was paying double before, and why - and whether anyone will ever check those contracts.

The picture is similar for enforced collection and enforcement orders: 18.5 million denars in 2024, 17.7 million in 2025, and 5 million so far in 2026. This year the municipality doesn't even have an external lawyer, which, the mayor says, avoids a cost of around 650,000 denars a year. That's money that left the municipal coffers every year for debts and court cases. Why so much - the report doesn't explain.

The list of projects and what is still to be seen

The rest is a classic progress report: more than 2,170 activities and over 1,500 administrative acts in urban planning between March and August, amendments to detailed urban plans covering around 20 hectares, preparations to sell around 40 building plots, rebuilt roads to the Holy Mother of God Prečista monastery and in the villages of Srbica, Vraneštica, Grešnica, Kolibari and Crvivci, new car parks and playgrounds, energy efficiency in schools and a 4D ultrasound machine for the General Hospital.

A new package of capital investment worth more than 470 million denars, or over 7.5 million euros, has also been announced - sports grounds in Gorica, the Osoj reservoir, smart water meters and a roughly 2.5-million-euro rebuild of the town square. Announcements are easy; they sit on paper. The school transport figure is something else: it says either that far more was being paid before than should have been, or that something in the numbers hasn't been fully told. Either way, the people of Kičevo have a right to know which one it is.