Turkish Prime Minister to try quicken the privatization of Albtelecom

TIRANA, March. 5 – The Turkish Prime Minister, Tayyip Erdogan, will be visiting Tirana for a meeting with his Albanian counterpart, to discus about “economic collaboration”. Erdogan’s visit has been expected and is supposed to quicken the finalization of the privatization of AlbTelecom. The Turkish PM will argue thus in favor of the Turkish company Calik Enerji. CE was the only bidder and winner in the bid to privatize AlbTelecom in April 2005 and has since signed the contract to pay 120 million euros for 76 percent of the ownership. However, the new right-wing dominated parliament has halted procedures declaring the bid to be irregular.
Turkish politicians have often tried to negotiate this issue starting with the Turkish Foreign Minister’s, Kursat Tuzman visit in which focused on trying to convince Albania to accept the Turkish offer. Turkey is eager to expand its influence in Albania, competing with its regional rival Greece. Turkish investments reached $ 150 million last year. Calik Enerji is a consortium operating in different areas from finance to Internet services and construction. The company owns also the second biggest bank in Albania, National Commercial Bank.