VOA: Ahmetaj from escape: Rama wants me as a scapegoat to hide the truth of the Tirana incinerator

2024-02-02 07:31:00, Aktualitet CNA

VOA: Ahmetaj from escape: Rama wants me as a scapegoat to hide the truth of the

With accusations against Prime Minister Edi Rama that he is trying to make him a scapegoat to hide the truths, according to him, that are hidden behind the incinerator of Tirana, and pointing the finger at the mayor of the capital Erion Veliaj, former Deputy Prime Minister Arben Ahmetaj, announced wanted internationally by the Albanian Justice authorities, appeared for the first time publicly, on Thursday evening, in a long interview on SyriTV television.

Without offering new facts or evidence, but mainly based on interpretations, he spoke about a political background in the actions of the Special Prosecutor's Office which, according to him, raised a case based on assumptions. For the first time, he admitted his close friendship with Mirel Mërtir, the name that, according to the Prosecutor's Office, stands behind three waste treatment plants in Elbasan, Fier and Tirana.

Since at the beginning of July, the Parliament requested the authorization for his arrest, Mr. Ahmetaj, is abroad. He made it clear that he was not living in hiding in the country where he is currently staying and that he had received an official status from the authorities of that country, probably the right to asylum. "From January 1, I live in a house owned by the municipality of the city where I officially live," declared the former deputy prime minister.

He denied running away to escape arrest.

"I didn't run away. No one allowed me to leave and no one helped me. At the moment I learned that my immunity was required, it was July 8 or 9, I was out of Albania on vacation. I refused to return because everything was oriented with political inspiration," said Mr. Ahmetaj.

In fact, Parliament made public the arrival of the Prosecution's request for authorization for his arrest on Monday, July 10. While the official document of the Special Prosecutor's Office dates back to July 7, the day Mr. Ahmetaj crossed the land border into Greece. While on July 14, his lawyers would declare that he was in England "near his family" and that he would return "when he has freedom".

With the longest lifespan in Prime Minister Rama's cabinets since his first term in 2013, covering important positions, Mr. Ahmetaj indicated that the break in the relationship between them had its origin earlier than July 2022, when he was dismissed from the position of number 2 of the government. He did not give any explanation as to why their relationship had changed. According to him, in February of that year, he himself had asked Mr. Rama to leave as "the relationship of trust between us had been overturned", but his request was not accepted.

The sudden departure from the government was followed a few weeks later by his removal from the posts in the socialist party, in a meeting of the leadership that, according to him, was accompanied by threatening tone from Mr. Rama. All movements, followed, as he said, by media attacks ordered by the prime minister, he said. According to him, the goal was "to ambush my former political leader" and that then the prosecutors were in a hurry to testify to the head of the government that "he ambushed us, and we killed him".

In March of last year, it was learned that the Special Prosecutor's Office had put him under investigation for at least 4 criminal offenses from "abuse of duty" to "non-declaration of assets", "corruption" and "money laundering". While in the file sent suspicions were raised in parliament about connections with incinerator entrepreneurs, financial benefits, and influence to favor concession procedures.

The prosecution also pointed out financial transactions with the sale and purchase of real estate, spanning over the years, behind which stood the two entrepreneurs of the incinerators, Klodian Zoto and Mirel Mërtiri. A multitude of acts undertaken in his functions as a minister, to enable these entrepreneurs to conclude concessionary contracts for three waste treatment plants in Elbasan, Tirana and Fier were the evidence that the Special Prosecutor's Office said it had against him.

Mr. Ahmetaj also insisted during the interview that he was not involved in the incinerator procedures and that he had even opposed that in the case of Tirana, the project be financed from the state budget. The variant offered by him was that Prime Minister Rama needed just such a person "to close the file" of the Tirana incinerator, a project in which, according to him, "he is one of the close people of the Prime Minister".

Mr. Ahmetaj went further when he declared that "if there is going to be a real investigation of the Tirana incinerator, Albanians want to know how far it will go, but SPAK does not. If Tirana is investigated, Albanians will love Llahtarisa, it will go very high". While the mayor of Tirana Erion Veliaj was part of the attacks against him, Mr. Ahmetaj said that some of the actions of the latter "are those of a de facto owner" of the incinerator.

The former deputy prime minister considered the businessman Mirel Mërtiri "a victim in relation to the incinerator of Tirana. He is no longer the owner, they took him, they exiled him to take his business", he declared, referring to some changes in the ownership of the company Integrated Energy, which received the right to build the incinerator. In May 2022, 40 percent of the shares passed to two French citizens with the same surname, Abitbol, ??who are connected to the last company he took over, the Albanian oil company Armo, before its final bankruptcy.

For the first time, Mr. Ahmetaj publicly admitted to having an early friendship with Mërtir. During his statements to the Parliamentary Investigative Committee on the issue of incinerators, he answered the question about his acquaintance with the entrepreneur, while last year in an interview for the show Opinion on TvKlan, he stated that "I knew Mirel Mërtir superficially in 2004 -2005. In 2012, we met again by chance at Blloku". While in the evening interview, on Thursday, he said that "Yes, I had a friend with Mirel, and the story between me and him is a story of the truth of how friendship is separated from the public interest", again referring to the fact that he was opposed the financing project of the Tirana incinerator.

Also, Mr. Ahmetaj offered a contrary explanation, to what he had done before, on the suspicions that the entrepreneurs of the incinerators had financed his stays several times in expensive hotels abroad. While in March of last year he spoke of "pure speculation" on this matter, and that he had not stayed in the hotels mentioned in the documents found on the computer of Klodian Zoto, Mërtir's partner, this time he admitted that he had been the last one who had made the payments by card, but that he had then given the money in cash, since he did not want his name to appear for personal reasons.