Hello everyone!

We were forced to hold this meeting with residents from the three municipalities because of the tight schedule and busy agenda of the next activities in Mat and Klos later today and in the municipality of Diber tomorrow. However, I would like to thank each and every one of you for attending this meeting.

I hope that the presentation would be a brief one, since I am already familiar with the lengthy version of the presentation by the three of your mayors, and I hope it contains sufficient and valuable information for you and everyone watching us, because a lot has been done and a lot has been delivered on projects that many of you and the residents living in rural areas might be unaware of.

Those who have never visited rural areas and the countryside all over Albania surely think that poverty prevails with people starving and that everyone is leaving the villages not only in Bulqizë, Mat, Klos, and Diber but all over the country. It is definitely true that there are people leaving the country, because this is an unavoidable phase in history that my other countries have been through earlier than us. It has happened for us, as everything else, for things to take place at a much later phase, because we have emerged from the communism’s hell, yet there are individuals constantly returning back home and launching successful business activities and employing many other people.

Earlier today we visited a medicinal plants collection and storage facility here in Bulqize, a business activity launched recently by a local young man, who has also been granted government assistance through the Agricultural and Rural Development Agency (ARDA) funds, helping and employing a growing number of local residents involved in harvesting a diversity of medicinal plants and herbs in this region.

This is a fact anyone can witness. One cannot earn 35000 lek daily by emigrating and working in England or elsewhere.

Of course, when it comes to the electricity price, Albania is the only country that hasn’t increased the electricity price rates on the families and the small businesses and no price cap has been applied to date. Why? This is because we think this is the path we should pursue as a government, which unlike what many propagate and what many think about, also thanks to these contaminated channels of communication for their own interests in using the TV screen as a mask to ambush the government and ask for things they are not entitled to, the truth is that we have maintained the electricity price unchanged. The truth is that the households still pay the pre-crisis price of 9.5 lek per kWh. The truth is that small businesses continue paying the pre-crisis electricity rate of 14 lek per kWh, if I am not mistaken. We have decided to do this, because we know quite well that if we were to raise the electricity price on the households, we would actually strain and restrict their purchase power at a time when commodity prices have soared. In the meantime, if we were to raise the electricity price rate on the small business, on the shops operating here, the inflation would rise immediately. In a nutshell, energy has no impact on Albania’s current inflation rate. Energy has a significant impact on the inflation rate in the countries around the world and it is for this reason that the prices of basic goods and items have increased almost twice as much as the prices in our country. This is the truth.

I would like to comment on the so-called “my personal taxi.” It is true that the government has signed an agreement with the national carrier Air Albania since we took over the OSCE’s chairmanship to promote the company by using one of its aircrafts during working visits, I emphasise, for working visits and not for private trips that I rarely do and I do so on my personal and family expenses. The accord with Air Albania has been renewed and amended and for you to know and everyone else to listen, because nobody would tell you. And you can’t certainly hear it from “the hyena non-grate,” a terrible combination of both hyena and non-grata. Just imagine an ugly hyena being also a non-grata hyena. This is catastrophic. So it is not wise to heed a hyena non-grata. It is even worse when one is both a hyena and also a spy. A hyena and also a spy. Just imagine it. Are one supposed to listen to them? There are other hyenas too, the ones howling day and night on the TV studios and the web-based news portals. But they are not to be blamed, because the prosecutors don’t move a finger against them, even though they have been referred to the prosecutor’s office on incredibly high fiscal evasion charges.

Instead of being summoned by the prosecutors to be held accountable for the millions of euros they have taken away from Albanians, because they have avoided paying taxes and we have done our job. So, the state has done its job, as they have been referred to the prosecutor’s office. The prosecutors don’t act against them. Just like the prosecutors are not acting against all these influential individuals, be it either them showing up on the TV screens or those who don’t make their way to the TV channels yet they are greedy. And the prosecutors fail to act. And I mean the Tirana prosecutor’s office, not the Special Anti-Crime and Anti-Corruption Office, SPAK. Tirana Prosecutor’s Office is a system that has yet to be properly reformed. However, let’s return to the most recent accusations of alleged high travel costs by using commercial charter flights. My travel costs on Albanian taxpayers in my capacity as the Prime Minister in 2021 were four times lower than the costs incurred by the previous prime minister in 2010. In other words, the cost of a flight of the previous prime minister was estimated at 2.5 million lek, whereas my flight cost is estimated at 650, 000 lek. This is the truth and these are official data as shown on the bills and ticket prices. This is the truth and not speculation. Not only that, but many journalists fly with that alleged “my private taxi” and they pay nothing indeed. And I am not flying alone, but I am accompanied by other official delegation members and they are usually small delegations as we don’t employ bodyguards when travelling abroad, as the hyena (former Prime Minister Sali Berisha) did because he feared being attacked.

But the truth is that this is the first government administration since 2013, because one could ask how come that the costs are this way, because neither I nor any cabinet member travels in business class since 2013. They all travel in economy class when flying with Air Albania planes. I already told you the cost of these flights. According to the agreement we have signed with Air Albania, the aircraft is a promotion for Albania and the national carrier too.

I was checking the budget costs for the famous private-public partnership deals or PPPS. Their cost is estimated at around 40 million euros a year. What are they for? These PPP contracts will be in force for the next 30 years.  And it is not about money being paid to them instantly. They are paid year after year. What are they paid for? They are paid so that the urban wastes are collected and processed. And what other contracts are for? They are awarded to ensure the best care service possible for women when giving birth to their kids, for patients when undergoing a surgery so that they do not contract post-operational infections as it was used to be the case when surgeons performed surgeries by using the China-era devices, representing the lowest or the basic standard of the medical devices and instruments, but which were being used in our hospitals across the country until recently. The medical instruments are now sterilized in line with the highest European Union standards and the post-operative infections rate has dropped significantly.

The PPP contracts have been awarded to help the dialysis patients and the medical check-up. All these are provided for free to patients across our health care system and of course such services come at a cost that is paid by the state budget. So every contract has been signed to provide and deliver best services to the people. But the opposition claims that these contracts cost 450 million euros. This is a pure lie.

I was very pleased to learn about things going on here in Bulqizë. The procedures are about to complete on constructing the segment between the Qafa e Buallit and the village of Plani i Bardhe, part of the Arberi Road. We will complete this project properly. Work is underway currently on opening the Murrizi Pass Tunnel after facing problems related to the geological formations and work progresses by opening just a meter of tunnel every day, compared to around 24 to 25 meters a day at the Llogara Tunnel. That’s why the project’s deadline has been postponed. However, procedures have already been completed regarding construction of the two last remaining segments and I very much hope everyone will be able to travel freely along the entire stretch of the new road, except for the tunnel, construction of which will take some more time due to the geological problems.

Thank you very much!