September 11, 2018 — Another offshoot in the zany world of Croatia’s legal labyrinth: a decade-old lawsuit finally decided who owns Zadar’s iconic Roman forum.
It belongs to 45 private citizens, according to a court ruling which found the town’s evidence of ownership lacking based upon an outdated law.
The Municipal Court in Zadar said turned down the city's claim to ownership of the iconic property, claiming the city’s evidence of ownership did not meet the standards of a law which has effectively been written out of the books but in effect at the time the lawsuit was filed.
The City of Zadar tried to include itself as an owner, but did not produce any evidence of ownership outside its legally-mandated upkeep of the ancient Roman square, according to Zadarski List. Property records show the land was divvied up into parcels and houses still in private ownership.
The ruling, delivered August 27, rejects the city’s claim that it owns the “Green Square” or Forum, which has been used effectively as a public space for over 100 years.
“These properties making up the City Forum represent a public area, which has served this purpose for over 150 years,” the city’s representatives wrote in the lawsuits. “On these parcels, we carry out our power in such a way that we maintain them, take care of them and treat them as our own, and nobody hindered us.
The attorneys, however, did not provide enough evidence outside the city’s maintenance to prove ownership. As the plaintiff, the city was required to disprove the existing owner's claims to the land, according to the Property Acquisition Act.
The court was bound to the relic of a law, which was the primary legal standard when the lawsuit was filed in 2008. The recently-passed Law On Communal Economics solves such issues, claiming public spaces and infrastructure belongs to the local government units in charge of maintaining them.
The City of Zadar has promised to appeal the decision.
