Socialist MP Zamira Sinaj declared on Tuesday in the parliamentary committee on Tourism that the company linked to the son-in-law of US President Donald Trump risks withdrawing from the investment in Sazani Island if the Parliament does not amend the law on “Tourist Ports”.
Through an amendment submitted to the Assembly, Sinaj has initiated a legal initiative that provides for the granting of tourist ports without competition to strategic investors.
“Sazani, the main case, is being withdrawn…” Sinaj said on Tuesday, responding to a question from the chair of the commission, Ina Zhupa, who asked him for examples to justify the need for intervention in the law.
“If this procedure is not regulated, the investor will leave,” she repeated, referring to a request submitted to the Strategic Investment Committee by the company represented by Jared Kushner.
Kushner’s affiliated company, Atlantic Incubation Partners LLC, received strategic investor status from the Albanian government in December 2024 for the construction of a tourist resort on Sazan Island, while Kushner had announced his plan for this investment earlier.
MP Sinaj used the Kushner case as an argument for intervening in the law with the aim of providing ‘legal certainty’ to strategic investors through what the MP called ‘procedural harmonization’ of the two laws; the one on “Tourist Ports” with the law on “Strategic Investments”.
The MP argued that the main problem identified in practice is the delays and blockages of important tourism investments.
In response, Zhupa asked Sinaj how the investment in Sazan could have been blocked, when it had not yet started, and during the meeting, she requested more clarification on the case, but the socialist MP refused to answer.
The legal change proposed by Sinaj, also supported by the government, provides that a strategic investor who will build tourist complexes on the coast and has foreseen the construction of a tourist port in the project will be granted the concession to build and operate the port without competition, which is currently prohibited by the law in force on ports.
Sinaj stated that the legal change will avoid a potential conflict between investors, if the construction of the port within a strategic investment could be won by another investor and not the one who has received the status of strategic investor.
She also claimed that there were other cases in Durrës and Vlora that strategic investors sought ‘security’ for the construction of tourist ports that were within approved strategic investments.
Zhupa opposed the legal initiative as an unconstitutional initiative and an attempt by the government to favor a few strategic investor names, by giving them the country’s tourist ports without competition.
“Instead of entering a competitive race, they receive it as a gift from the government,” Zhupa said.
“This, in effect, shifts the process from an open competition to a direct agreement between the government and the private entity,” she added.
According to Zhupa, the exclusion of a category of entities from the obligation for a competitive procedure creates preferential treatment, limits the access of other economic operators and violates equality of opportunity in the market.
“The competitive procedure is not an administrative formality, but a constitutional mechanism that guarantees the protection of the public interest and the optimal use of state assets,” she stressed./ BIRN
