The Municipality of Tirana and Mayor Erion Veliaj have appealed to the Administrative Court of Appeal the July 24 decision of the First Instance, which refused to review the lawsuit against Prosecutor Ols Dado on its merits.

Veliaj says that at the time of his appointment in 2008, Dado had not completed the Magistrates' School and did not meet the legal criteria to be appointed as a prosecutor. Veliaj claims that the court closed the case for lack of legitimacy, without verifying whether the appointment act was absolutely invalid.

NOTIFICATION

Erion Veliaj and the Municipality of Tirana have appealed the decision of the Tirana First Instance Administrative Court, which refused to examine the merits of the lawsuit seeking the determination of the absolute invalidity of the decree appointing Ols Dado to the position of prosecutor.

The essence of the issue is simple: can a person who is alleged to have been appointed in violation of the mandatory criteria of the law exercise the criminal power of the state? The Court did not answer this question. It closed the case for lack of legitimacy, without examining the merits of the fact that, at the time of his appointment in 2008, Ols Dado had not completed the Magistrates' School and, according to the lawsuit, did not meet any of the exceptional legal criteria that would allow his appointment as a prosecutor.

The issue becomes even more serious because absolute invalidity is alleged – the most serious form of illegality of an administrative act. The law provides that it can be established at any time, even principally by the court itself. However, the Court closed the process for lack of legitimacy, without examining precisely what the law allows and requires it to establish principally: whether or not the act that granted Ols Dado the status of prosecutor is absolutely invalid. So, faced with the claim that the criminal power of the state may have been exercised for years on the basis of a legally invalid act, the Court chose not to verify this claim at all.

This issue goes beyond Erion Veliaj's individual interest. It raises a fundamental question about the rule of law: are everyone equal before the law, or are prosecutors and judges exempt from judicial review of the legality of the title over which they exercise their power?

The Mayor, democratically elected by around 160 citizens of Tirana, has been subjected to the criminal power of the state, has been in detention for 18 months without a court verdict of guilt and is being tried for the suspicions raised against him.

Why, then, should the prosecutor who has exercised this criminal power remain beyond the control of a court on an elementary question: has he legally acquired the status and competence to act as a prosecutor? If the one elected by the citizens must be subject to the law and the court, why does the appointed prosecutor refuse to be subject to the same standard for the legality of the power he exercises?

Equality before the law cannot only work for the accused. Even the power that investigates and accuses must prove that it stems from the law.
This is exactly what we requested from the Administrative Court of First Instance and this is exactly what we are requesting today from the Administrative Court of Appeal: no immunity for the Mayor, but no immunity from judicial control for the prosecutor.