Prime Minister Edi Rama responded to the debates about legal changes in the tourist port sector, describing the opposition's criticism as "a unique species" that, according to him, aims to distort reality.
During his statement, Rama explained that there have been no fundamental changes to the law on tourist ports, but only a technical intervention to avoid situations that he described as "absurd consequences" in its implementation. According to the prime minister, in these cases there is no need for new competitions, since the investor is the owner of the project himself and is obliged to respect the relevant rules and payments.
Rama stressed that the aim is to avoid procedural conflicts and delays that, according to him, would block tourism projects. He also spoke about the strategic investment law, stating that its review process is ongoing and that the aim is to avoid legal loopholes. The Prime Minister also criticized the opposition, claiming that its positions aim to create negative perceptions about Albania in the European integration process.
"We have not made any legal changes to tourist ports. We have made a single change to remove the possibility of an absurd consequence. The change is not related to tourist ports, to zero competitions. If the Albanian state will grant a concession or a partner to build a tourist port, it will be done only through competition. The change we have made is related only to cases when someone invests in a tourist resort and will build a marina. For the unchanged law, for the marina that someone will build near his resort, there must be competition for another to come and a fight will start that will never end. We were caused by the fact that we had not made the difference between a case when a tourist port is built and cases when the investors themselves who own the property on that territory want to build a marina. As in the whole planet, they must do it by paying the relevant obligation, by paying themselves. This is the big change. There is no change, except for their greed that they want to see Albania blocked like never before. This is what my friends tell me. We have not seen it coming any force that has negotiated with the EU or is in the process of opening negotiations and saying all kinds of nonsense to block the process. We do not come from a country with ethical, religious or ideological problems or from a civil war. No one has seen the Serbs of Montenegro or other countries demanding that the country be blacklisted. Have these countries had problems similar to ours? Of course! We have a kind of species here that is unique, that no country on the continent where we are, has had, in this process. That's all. For the law on strategic investors, we have in the process of transforming the entire law. The law has been postponed so as not to leave a vacuum with the old law. It was not our invention, but other countries have done it too," he said.
