TIRANA, Aug. 4 – Environmentalists and activists have joined Kamza residents to protest a garbage crisis in the city.
Trash has been piling for weeks on the streets as the municipality is trying to find an appropriate landfill to take the waste to. Authorities had resorted to burning some of a trash or dumping it a nearby riverbed, facing more ire from nearby residents.
Once a sleepy Tirana suburb, Kamza has become one of Albania’s most populous municipalities following massive movement to the area just north of Tirana after the fall of communism with new residents primarily coming from rural areas in northern and eastern Albania.
Activists, led by Sazan Guri, ended their protests after meeting Kamza Mayor Xhelal Mziu, who asked protesters for a week to come up with a solution to the problem.
Protesters warn of massive protests should the mayor not present a proper solution within the set deadline.
Mayor Xhelal Mziu said he believes the protests are being used politically, adding many protesters do not live in the area he manages.
Mayor Mziu said that a landfill project has been approved by the municipality, but is being delayed by Albania’s central government, which has not issued the proper permits.
He said trash would start to be moved to a landfill in another neighboring municipality Fushe Kruje as a temporary solution.
An opposition Democratic Party stronghold and poorer than the neighbouring large Tirana municipality, Kamza municipality is one of the few major municipalities still managed by the center-right opposition party, and Mziu has often complained of political discrimination from the Socialist-led central government.
The Albanian Helsinki Committee also issued a statement calling for a prompt solution to the problem based on the harm being done to residents’ rights and quality of life.
