After the discovery of €863,000 in cash and two boating licenses belonging to former Minister Saimir Tahiri in the car of 25-year-old businessman Orest Sota this weekend, the opposition has intensified its attack on the “mafia state” of Prime Minister Edi Rama.
Sota, whose construction company Eco Construction and Partners received several tenders to reconstruct police commissariats during the tenure of Tahiri, reportedly tried to escape police control after committing traffic violations. He also was driving without his license. Sota claimed the money was to buy a load of iron, but Opinion calculated that such a sum would buy him 2,000 tons, which could not be transported by SUV but needed 70 trucks.
Sota also denied knowing Tahiri, whose two boating licenses were found with the sum in cash. Tahiri had always denied owning a boat, while Sota’s claim is contradicted by TIMS data, showing him crossing the Albanian border several times at the same date and time as Tahiri.
In response to those events, the Democratic Party has boycotted today’s session of the parliamentary Commission for Legal Affairs. which was supposed to discuss the 2018 budget. PD deputy Eduard Halimi declared:
In a normal situation we would discuss this very important law [of the 2018 budget]. But that happens with a normal government, and not a government linked with crime and drugs. The government is caught in the act with crime. Instead of maintaining the side of justice, it supported the Habilaj clan.
A few days ago we had the €863,000 and the licenses of former Minister Tahiri, who shore that he didn’t have a boating license.
Deputy Flamur Nik expressed the same sentiments during a press conference:
This government is not of the Albanians, but of traffic and gangs. This government cannot make a budget, its days are counted. This government bought the votes and fill be brought down in democratic way. The citizens voted because the driver wanted the steering wheel do direct the country. The truth came out when they didn’t have a license to direct the country, but this government and driver had licenses to direct motorboats, traffic, and organized crime.
