"Don't touch the flowers" investments, municipalities realize only 5% of the annual program in 3 months

2025-05-30 07:26:00, Ekonomi CNA

"Don't touch the flowers" investments, municipalities realize

Despite the fact that the country was involved in the campaign for the general elections in the first three months of 2025 and local government was mobilized to be closer to citizens, the realization of public investments by municipalities continued to be very weak.

Official data from the Ministry of Finance shows that in the first 3 months of 2025, municipalities invested only 1.8 billion lek (18 million euros), or just 5 percent of the annual fund of 35.7 billion lek. At this rate, the investment performance of local governments will be even lower than last year, when only 43% of the program was implemented.

Of the 18 million euros invested, a large part went to investments and reconstruction, asphalting, maintenance of roads in rural and urban areas, as well as improving the public lighting network. A very small part of the funds was used for the reconstruction of 9-year schools, high schools, kindergartens and nurseries.

The central and local governments have been deepening the problem of non-implementation of investment programs in recent years. Most municipalities fail to implement even 40 percent of the program due to poor planning and delays.

Municipalities suffer from a lack of qualified staff in project management, especially in planning and monitoring capital investments. Tender procedures are often repeatedly contested by participating companies, leading to delays.

Expert analyses have shown that inter-institutional coordination between municipalities, central government, and other agencies is weak, creating bureaucratic obstacles and additional delays.

Official data from the Ministry of Finance shows that local government units burned through more than half of the public investment program last year.

The final data on the 2024 budget shows that the local government implemented only 43 percent of the investment program. Of the planned 46.3 billion lek, only 19.9 billion lek were invested, or less than half of the program.

The inability of municipalities to allocate investments comes at a time when they are facing great needs to invest, especially in local road infrastructure. For example, the Municipality of Durrës, which is the main host of tourists in the country and has great needs in local infrastructure, has only implemented 50 percent of the investment program for 2024.

Among the municipalities with a prefecture center, it is seen that Vlora had the weakest implementation with only 17% of the program. In 2024, only 251 million lek were invested out of the 1.4 billion lek that was the annual program./ Monitor Magazine