Dzimi Komerc Billed Naftagas 91 Million Dinars
The Sombor firm whose excavators stood around Cacilend billed about 70 percent of its Naftagas contract in nine months, BIRN reports. The firm and NIS did not respond.
A construction firm from Sombor, whose excavators stood around the “Cacilend” camp in Belgrade’s Pionirski Park in March 2025, has billed Naftagas, a company within the NIS group, about 91 million dinars this year. The firm is Dzimi Komerc, and the details of its Naftagas contract were published by BIRN on October 19, citing documents it had seen. This newsroom has not seen those documents, so everything below rests on the claims of BIRN and its sources.
What does the Dzimi Komerc contract with Naftagas say?
Dzimi Komerc signed a two-year contract with Naftagas, which is owned by NIS, in January 2026. The contract runs until the end of 2027 and has a maximum value of 130 million dinars (about 1.1 million euros) before VAT, covering transport services and the hire of work machinery. In earlier years the Sombor firm had a smaller contract with Naftagas-Naftni servisi, another NIS company.
BIRN gives two figures for the same period: in one place 91 million dinars billed over nine months, in another almost 92 million from January to September 2026. Either way, that is about 70 percent of the value of the whole contract, with only nine of its 24 months elapsed.
What do a worker and a source familiar with the firm say?
Several daily work logs seen by BIRN record 21 or 22 working hours a day, and on March 31, 2026, 24 hours were billed. One company worker, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told BIRN that the firm had ordered staff to log at least five hours even when the machines were not running:
“There were days when no machine was engaged at all, or only a little, and five hours were written down regardless.”
Asked how realistic it is that the machines worked 20 hours or more, the same worker replied: “From my experience, a shift that long can’t be logged. Around 6 to 7 hours is an average working day, but working more than 12 hours is impossible.”
A second anonymous source familiar with the firm’s operations explained why, in his words, it was done: “They were in the mindset of squeezing out as much money as possible until NIS is sold.”
Who is Mile Samardzija, and how did his firm end up around “Cacilend”?
The firm’s director is Mile Samardzija (63), who owned half of Dzimi Komerc until August 2026, when he formally transferred his stake to his daughter. The firm was founded in 2000, and the other co-owner is Ljiljana Teslic.
Ahead of the large student protest on March 15, 2025, supporters of the ruling SNS brought excavators and tractors to the front of “Cacilend.” According to BIRN, some of the excavators belonged to this firm, and its workers drove them to Belgrade. Samardzija’s trucks carry “Serbia Wins” stickers, and at an SNS rally in front of the Spens hall in Novi Sad on May 19, 2024, he brought workers in company T-shirts carrying the firm’s flag.
A source cited by BIRN claims that Samardzija was brought closer to the party by Zoran Rus, the former Speaker of the Sombor Municipal Assembly and former SNS commissioner for Sombor, who is now acting director of the Directorate for Safety and Health at Work in the Ministry of Labor.
Bozo Draskovic, a former member of the Board of the Anti-Corruption Agency, told BIRN that this is a pattern not based on the market:
“The owners of these firms are driven by economic interest, for them it is business. But that business is no longer free business and market competition, but privileged business that is obtained through political connections.”
A dispute with a co-owner and a prosecutor’s decision
Ljiljana Teslic reported Samardzija to the police for threats on September 25, 2025, and January 21, 2026. In the report for the second incident, which BIRN saw, Samardzija is said to have told her: “You will all go under the ground, the earth will swallow you.” The quarrel was over the purchase of a plot of land.
The police filed a criminal complaint, but the Basic Public Prosecutor’s Office in Sombor dismissed it in April 2026. Prosecutor Predrag Ivanisevic found there was no criminal offense of endangering security, because the threat was uttered during an argument over a land purchase. In a letter to the Internal Control Sector of the Interior Ministry, Teslic’s lawyer claims that Samardzija, with the support of SNS representatives, is trying to push her out of the firm.
Who did not respond
Samardzija, his daughter and NIS did not respond to BIRN’s questions, and Ljiljana Teslic declined to speak to the media. According to the Vreme report, BIRN has not established where the money went.
The story surfaces five days before the elections scheduled for October 25. For the institutions, a concrete question remains: whether anyone will compare the daily work logs with the invoices that Naftagas paid.
