Belind Kelliçi’s Tirana Municipality program also includes the elimination of some taxes and the reduction of fees for the capital’s citizens, which will benefit 41,000 small and medium-sized businesses. He called the education tax, which has not been translated into schools, kindergartens, or nurseries, unconstitutional in the “Debate” Studio on A2 CNN. He drew attention to several Tirana neighborhoods where 124,000 people live without access to schools, kindergartens, or nurseries.
“The infrastructure tax in education is unconstitutional, and we have not seen the benefits of this tax, claiming that kindergartens and nurseries have been built with it. There is an area in Kombinat, unit 14, which is the new Ring Road in Astir, with 70,000 residents and zero kindergartens, zero schools, zero nurseries. There is an area with 54,000 residents and zero kindergartens, zero schools, zero nurseries.
He outlined all of the taxes and fees that will be eliminated, emphasizing that this will result in an increase in the municipality’s budget and a shift from an informal to a formal economy.
This will provide relief for small and medium-sized businesses, as well as a reduction in several other taxes: we will remove the agricultural land tax for the portion that belongs to the municipality, we will reduce the hotel stay tax by 30%, we will reduce the land information table tax, and we will reduce the building tax by 30%. There are two tariffs: the green cleaning tariff, which all businesses complain about, and the most corrupt tariff, which everyone pays under the table, which is the public space tariff, which we will reduce by 50%. This means that the municipality’s budget will grow because we will transition from an informal to a formal economy, and businesses will start paying taxes because they will be able to afford it, and we will have more subjects who pay bills.”
Meanwhile, analyst Dervishi advocated for greater tax transparency and citizen participation.