Prosecutors have proposed filing charges against the only Albanian member of the Serbian Parliament, Shaip Kamberi.
They expect charge him with “exceeding budget” for the year 2018, when Kamberi was the mayor of Bujanoc, a Serbian town with an Albanian ethnic majority. The MP made the announcement after receiving information from the Special Prosecution Office of Nis.
Kamberi explained that he had signed an infrastructure project that would be implemented over one year, thus exceeding that year’s budget – a normal procedure in all small municipalities with small budgets. “[Otherwise, small municipalities] would never be able to implement any big project,” he stated.
However, prosecutors have singled him out for prosecution, he stated, while categorically denying any abuse with funds.
“It’s interesting how in a state where mafia and organized crime ties to power are an everyday event, the Special Prosecution goes after me regarding a practice found in many municipalities in Serbia,” Kamberi noted.
“This comes only a few months before parliamentary elections,” he added, “which shows that I am getting this treatment not as former Bujanoc mayor, but as an opposition member of the Serbian Parliament.”
