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Locals, Rama candidate in 5 municipalities

Politiko 2025-07-07 15:32:22

Locals, Rama candidate in 5 municipalities


Tirana, Tepelena, Tropoja, Mati and Berat are five municipalities that will be forced to hold partial local elections, although the legal deadlines have long been exceeded and violated. The violator is the well-known absentee prime minister, the controller of the government procedure in the center and in the regions, where the prefects, after notifications from the respective municipal councils, must notify the vacancies in writing, in order to move forward with the electoral process. Two mayors are in prison and under house arrest, two under investigation by SPAK, but mandated as deputies in the elections of May 11, 2025. The mayors with a coercive measure from the prosecution, the Council of Ministers should have been dismissed, to be replaced with another elected one, as the law provides.

It is half of the inhabitants of Albania, the inhabitants of Tirana, who have not had a mayor in office for more than five months, since the arrest of Erion Veliaj by the Special Prosecution Office on February 10, 2025, on charges of abuse of office, concealment of assets, failure to declare and interests with third parties. In the Municipality of Tirana, the situation is more serious than in any institution in the country. There are also many directors arrested for serious criminal offenses, from corruption, laundering of proceeds of crime and structured criminal groups. Rama still does not have the guts to dismiss Veliaj, nor does the Municipal Council have the nerve to send the necessary documents. The Prime Minister has decided to run the largest municipality in the country himself, dismissing and appointing directors according to personal appetite, just like in Vlora. The unit should have gone to the polls at least three months earlier. Three days ago, the head of government returned to the capital as mayor, ordering to go out into the field to talk to the people, although he has not yet spoken to himself. The investigations in the Municipality of Tirana are about the 430 million euro incinerator, the directors of Veliaj's 5D scheme, the collapse of the National Theater, and others, such as Eco Tirana, constructions with the 'Ndrangheta, tree planting, and many road tenders. The defendants will have to go to the elections to gain the trust of the masters of theft and corruption.

The state of legal devastation for not holding local elections in Tropoja is more severe than anywhere else. The city has been without a mayor in office since September 2024, when the Special Structure requested and the Court, which took the house arrest measure for Mayor Rexhë Byberaj and Deputy Mayor Abedin Kërrnaja, on charges of abuse of office and destruction of property, being officially defendants. The investigation speaks of a damage of close to 2.8 million euros. Meanwhile, even after nine months of justice decisions, the state of municipal governance is extreme illegality, because that is how the majority rules from cells and arrests. The Ustallars think that by not removing pensioners from offices, or perhaps rehiring those who have passed the appropriate legal age, they will try to steal votes somewhere in the next race.

The three former mayors of Mat, Tepelena and Berat, namely Agron Malaj, Tërmet Peçi and Ervin Demo, resigned after running for deputies of the Socialist Party in the elections of May 11, 2025. All three won and today are majority parliamentarians with the start of the session in September. Malaj and Peçi have started and unfinished stories with the Special Structure. Their files in the prosecution are for quite a few issues. Malaj has been summoned by the prosecutors and the files will wait to be confronted in Court, where there may be other decisions along the way, bringing new legal situations. In the municipality, there are also many tenders, part of the reports made, which will be part of the investigation. While the former mayor of Tepelena has a more recent proximity to the investigations. A few days after the elections where he took the mandate of the deputy, the Special Structure has seized several files for tenders in the Municipality of Tepelena, worth over 60 million euros, where the accusation's suspicions are for abuse of public funds. If the Prosecution proves the suspicions about the involvement of two former local elected officials, Mat and Tepelena, then there will be requests against them for the lifting of their immunities in the Assembly. While in Berat, from the election of Ervin Demos as deputy, there remains the space for a rerun of the elections. In the four municipalities where the fall may bring local elections, the stories with SPAK are there as evidence of how their predecessors and their political strength have governed. A yellowed photocopy of the government that has almost all the ministers in prison, under arrest, defendants and under investigation. He is a candidate and mayor himself, so he holds the mandates without being elected. The DP and the opposition always face corruption, as candidates to be defeated.

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