Central government holds regular meetings with local authorities

TIRANA, Sep. 24 – Top officials of the central government, including Prime Minister Sali Berisha, have recently held a series of meetings with representatives of the local authorities in an effort to establish better communication between the two powers.
Berisha said in his last meeting with prefects that cooperation with local authorities was a decisive factor to improve governing in the country.
Local authorities have long asked that the decentralization process be carried out, which is a fundamental issue along the country’s integration efforts into the European Union.
Berisha assured the local officials that the percentage from the public budget would increase and at the moment the government had allocated some 20 billion leks to them.
But he also asked them to collect local taxes and increase their budget.