Nikola Tarbuk new Secretary General of the SCTM

Delegates of the 49^th Assembly of the Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities held on December 8, 2021, unanimously supported the Decision of the Presidency on the appointment of Nikola Tarbuk to the position of Secretary General of the SCTM.

Nikola Tarbuk succeeded the long-term Secretary General Djordje Stanicic in this important position, and on this occasion Mr. Stanicic received a special plaque for the successful management of the SCTM during the past 20 years.

"One cannot choose a better boss, and it is not so easy to follow the footsteps of such a person who has dedicated and merged his whole being with our organization. I am encouraged by the fact that we have a strong foundation, as well as the belief that we will continue to have his support and readiness to continue working together on the development of local self-government", said the new Secretary General in his first address.

Tarbuk thanked his colleagues from the SCTM, international organizations and partners for the knowledge they passed on to him. He said that during his long career in the SCTM, the organization tried to be a true representative of local authorities, and that he hopes that it succeeds.

"As in the family, here we try to provide support to each of our members. The basic policy will not change, I hope that I will justify the trust shown to me today. I call on the members to participate even more actively in the work and use everything that is provided to them. Thank you for your trust", Tarbuk said.

Nikola Tarbuk has 16 years of work experience in the SCTM, during which he performed several responsible functions and represented the organization in many important bodies and processes. In the period 2008-2018, he was the Assistant Secretary General of the SCTM for Advocacy, and since 2018 he has been the Deputy Secretary General for Advocacy of Membership Interests.

Since the beginning of his work engagement in the organization, Tarbuk has been working as a project manager, and for 11 years he has been the manager of the most important project for institutional development of the SCTM, supported by the Government of Switzerland. Nikola Tarbuk participated in the drafting of numerous national regulations and documents on behalf of the SCTM and is a representative of the Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities in several important bodies of the Serbian Government such as the Council for Professional Development of Local Self-Government Employees, the Commission for Local Government Financing, and the Public Administration Reform Council.

Djordje Stanicic thanked his successor for his kind words, whom he personally congratulated on his appointment, and he said "the decisions made, the dismissals, touched me a little, but it is a logical path".

"I have enthusiasm, a little less energy, but Nikola has it and I believe that he will be at everyone's service. I worked with my soul and body, heart and knowledge, and I thank the collaborators who followed me in that. All my life I have been dealing with local self-government. The function is to satisfy the interests of local self-governments and our organization. I am sure that Nikola will succeed in that, and from what I hear from you, both formally and informally, it seems that I also succeeded a little bit", said Stanicic.

As he added, he does not have to promise to continue cooperation with the organization, because his answer is "definitely yes".

Djordje Stanicic began his professional career in 1979 at the Standing Conference of Cities and Municipalities of Yugoslavia, as a lawyer and head of the General Service. Since 1982, he has been the Secretary of the Committee for Communal Activities and Housing of the SCTM, and later a Senior Advisor to the SCTM, working in various areas of interest to municipalities.

At the 31st Assembly of the SCTM in 2001, he was elected Secretary General. He was the leader of the national delegation of Serbia and Montenegro at the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe, and a titular member of the ad-hoc working group of local and regional elected representatives of Southeast Europe (within CLRAE), and a member of numerous national auditing committees for the decentralization of public services of Serbia.