Whenever Edi Rama is reminded of the millions of euros that were burned in vain at the Elbasan incinerator, the prime minister evades responsibility with a simple alibi. He admits that along the way, his trusted people "ate apples and pears behind his back, but then they were sentenced to prison and despite the thefts, here is the plant in Elbasan, which processes waste, burns it and produces electricity.
With this alibi, he has been answering the charges for almost ten years for the corruption scandal that led to the imprisonment of Lefter Koka, Alqi Bllako, and the conviction of the fugitives of the private company Stela Gugallja, Klodian Mërtiri, and Klodian Zoto.
In short, Rama's alibi is summarized in these sentences he said to the residents of Elbasan during the 2023 campaign.
"Were there problems? There were problems. Were there people who wanted to extract honey from the garbage? There were! They have their own job. But the plant is there and Elbasan has clean air," Rama said.
But reality and propaganda are far apart. The so-called "modern plant" for which 26 million euros were paid was actually a shack placed next to the garbage mountain in Elbasan to justify corruption. It is said that it did the job for a few months, but then it was turned off. Since then, local officials in Elbasan have been forced to maintain Edi Rama's alibi, according to which the incinerator works normally, burns waste, and even produces electricity.
For the small plant they had left, they justified it by saying it was defective and needed a minor repair; sometimes they said it was working, but with limited capacity, and sometimes they openly lied that energy was being produced there and the waste problem had been solved for the city.
But every year in winter the mountain of garbage grew rapidly, while in summer the waste caught fire, giant plumes of smoke rose like a black cloud over the city, and there was no propaganda to cover up a shocking fact that regularly poisoned citizens.
Therefore, in a meeting of the Municipal Council, uncovered by journalist Bardha Nergjoni for Reporter.al, it appears that the game of lies is over. For the first time, even socialist officials have no hold on them, and they are forced to refute Rama's lies.
The administrator of the Eco-Elb company that manages the Leli Kaja plant has bluntly stated that the mountain of garbage is so large that it has collapsed several slopes in the landfill. Therefore, the city needs a new landfill.
"A new landfill needs to be built. The amount of waste has managed to collapse some of the side slopes of the landfill," Kaja said at the meeting.
According to Kaja, over 150 tons of waste enter the landfill every day and it is impossible to organize this amount. “There will be danger again,” he warned.
At the same meeting, the mayor of Elbasan, Gledian Llatja, was forced to accept the truth and spoke openly to the municipal councilors, admitting that he would ask the prime minister for money for a new landfill.
"We are unable to build a new landfill with the budget and we have reached out to the Albanian government to build the new landfill. We are all ready to look at other places for the new landfill," Llatja declared.
The dam that Rama's government built in Elbasan cost the state 26 million euros, a rotten project from the beginning because its sole purpose was to steal tax money. The project also passed through Prime Minister Rama's desk with an illegal procedure called "negotiation without announcement", but Rama refused to sign it.
There were some voices in the government that opposed it, because the "negotiation without announcement" procedure that Lefter Koka had chosen was not provided for in the law. Rama did not openly oppose it, because he needed Lefter Koka's votes in Durrës for the 2017 elections.
At the government meeting when decision no. 907 was to be passed, he avoided the signature that would criminally implicate him in this affair.
The decision was signed by the then Deputy Prime Minister, Niko Peleshi. The SPAK file explained that there was also a technical error in the decision and Niko Peleshi re-signed the corrected document.
However, politically the prime minister was always a supporter of the idea of waste incineration. Before the 2017 elections, he organized a Socialist Party event at the Elbasan incinerator, as a guarantee given to Lefter Koka, who was under investigation by SPAK. As it turned out later, Koka was abandoned and sentenced for all three incinerator affairs.
Meanwhile, the mountain of garbage in Elbasan continues to grow. Local officials are under pressure to keep their mouths shut and not talk about the waste that is simply burning in the open and poisoning citizens. In a meeting at the prime minister's office, Rama directly criticized Mayor Gledian Llatja for a fire in the city's cemetery, sending him a threatening message for the future.
Editorial
