The new changes were rejected by the opposition which described them as unconstitutional and said it would appeal them to the Constitutional Court
TIRANA, July 19 – The legal affairs parliamentary commission approved this week some changes to the property compensation and restitution law aimed at reviewing some controversial decisions made by former regional property agencies and commissions.
According to the changes proposed by ruling Democratic Party lawmaker Enkelejd Alibeaj, citizens can file requests with the Property Restitution and Compensation Agency (PRCA) to review past decisions which are not being examined by court or on which no final court decision has been made yet.
The amendment proposed by Alibeaj grants the right to some 8,000 owners involved in property conflicts to address the PRCA to reexamine past decisions made by the former property committee.
According to PRCA’s director general Elvis Cefa, courts do not have the professional ability of the Agency, which is a specialized body to investigate property issues.
Cefa said that some 60,000 property decisions have been made during the past 17 years after the communism collapsed, thousands of which abusively taken.
The new changes were rejected by the opposition which described them as unconstitutional and said it would appeal them to the Constitutional Court.
Earlier this year, the Constitutional Court turned down as unconstitutional an article of the property law which granted the agency’s director general the right to re-examine on his own initiative past decisions which could be considered abusive.
The property issue has been one of the most controversial in Albania during the past 20 years leading to many conflicts and abuses. Establishing a clear property rights system still remains a challenge for Albanian authorities to attract more foreign investors.
