In March 2022, the Mayor of Durrës, Emiriana Sako, posted on her Facebook profile a video inspection of the works for the new Durrës hydroelectric dam, in the Porto Romano area.
"The investments and work we have done to rehabilitate the high-water canals and build the new dam will solve the problem of flooding in the city," Sako declared during a heated conversation with an employee who was there.
This post is more than enough evidence for SPAK to open investigations into what is suspected to be one of the darkest corrupt affairs of Ms. Sako, who, given the damage caused to the public, both financial and otherwise, can be safely classified as Rilindja's number 2 lunatic. And if SPAK is still not convinced, the hydropower file is almost ready.
In December 2021, the Municipality of Durrës opened a tender for 1.972 billion lek, or 20.5 million euros at the current exchange rate, for the rehabilitation of canals and the construction of a new hydrovor in the city of Durrës. Sako justified the construction of the new hydrovor with the fact that the existing hydrovor was damaged by the earthquake, while the Bashke movement denounced the day before that the old hydrovor was destroyed to allow the expansion of the concession port of the Adriatic Bay Investment Group company.
However, the procedure for the construction of the new dam was carried out through a limited tender, always under the pretext of reconstruction from the earthquake, even though the latter had been going on for more than 2 years.
And the reasons why the 20 million euros were procured through a truncated competition were revealed only two weeks later, when Emiriana Sako appointed the winner of the big deal. It was the merger of three companies, consisting of 2T, Vëllezërit Hysa and Adriatik shpk. They won the tender with 99.9 percent of the limit fund, saving citizens less than 20 thousand euros on a 20 million euro contract.
Winners of the 20 million euro non-competitive tender for the hydroelectric power plant
But who was behind the hydrovor affair? The answer is a network of companies owned by senior Rilindja officials.
2T is Sako's company, one of the 4 public works companies that became budgetary monsters with the arrival of Belinda Balluku at the head of the Ministry of Infrastructure. At that time, Gramos Sako held the post of commander of the guard, while last year he was appointed vizier in the former pashalak of Ali Pasha.
Adriatik shpk is the company of Spartak Kovaç, former director of the Durrës water supply, family member of Ceno Klos, at that time General Director of the Water Supply and Sewerage Agency, and a person very close to Belinda Balluku. So they got the 20 million euro tender themselves, just like the 5D scheme in Tirana, only in Durrës the acronym was 5B.
But to close the loophole, the project designer was Invictus, while its supervisor was a company called Hydro-Eng Consulting. The latter is owned by Elvis Qyrku and was founded only 6 months before the hydropower tender. So a company with no experience is assigned the contract to supervise a vital work for the city of Durrës.
In fact, since the centralization of water supply in the Ministry of Infrastructure and their removal from the municipalities, all water supply companies have operated according to a closed scheme, where almost all tenders have been taken by a handful of companies linked to the Balluku-Klosi duo. A pure 5B or even 5K scheme.
In Durrës, it didn't take long for the dark ink of corruption to surface. Durrës' new dam, despite costing a full 20 million euros, is not functioning, causing the city to flood continuously every time it rains.
The apocalyptic scenes of the day before were the climax that exposed the great affair of the hydropower plant to the citizens openly in public. Now it is the duty of SPAK to verify where the 20 million euros that were violently obtained through a tender without competition have gone. And with it, many other tenders of Emiriana Sako, who, under the pretext of the earthquake, has raised one of the largest corruption pits of public money in Durrës. So much so that Gjushi really resembles ice cream.
Editorial
