The first six months of the year have been busy for the legal defense team of former Prime Minister Sali Berisha, who has been banned from crossing the threshold of his home since December 30, 2023. He is accused of favoring his son-in-law, Jamarbër Malltezi, during the time he headed the government, between 2005 and 2013, in the privatization procedures of the former “Partizani” sports complex, a process that provided Malltezi with a profit of around 5.5 million euros.
Berisha has never admitted the charges brought against him and his daughter Argita’s husband, and since the end of last year he has been seeking freedom in order to exercise his mandate as a member of parliament for the Democratic Party. All of Berisha’s requests, at every level of the judiciary, have been rejected.
Procedural steps of security measures
On December 30, 2023, former Prime Minister Sali Berisha was placed under “house arrest” by the Special Court against Corruption and Organized Crime, at the request of SPAK, marking the first harsh security measure for a high-profile politician in 33 years of democracy. Berisha had previously been placed under “compulsory appearance” and his passport had been blocked so that he could not leave Albania.
But Berisha never respected the obligation to appear before the judicial police, considering the imposed measure as unconstitutional, claiming that SPAK had not initially requested Parliament to lift his immunity. SPAK was assisted in lifting his immunity by the majority, which, having the “strength of numbers” in Parliament, voted on December 22, 2023 to lift Berisha’s immunity, which automatically led to the tightening of the security measure against him.
Since that moment, Berisha’s legal defense team has continuously appealed to the Special Court of Appeals to lift the “house arrest” measure against Berisha and Malltezi, but without success. To date, all requests have been rejected by all levels of the judiciary. The former Prime Minister has also been denied requests to participate in plenary sessions in the Assembly, in order to normally exercise his mandate as a member of the Democratic Party.
The trial against the former prime minister was the “second political downfall” after he was declared “undesirable” by the US State Department in 2021, under the argument that he had committed “corrupt acts that undermine democracy in Albania.”
A year later, in July 2022, Sali Berisha was also declared “non grata” by the United Kingdom on charges of “clear links to organized crime groups, criminals, and corruption.”
SPAK investigations
More than 3 years ago, Taulant Balla, then leader of the Socialist Party group, filed a criminal complaint with SPAK against one of his fiercest political rivals, Sali Berisha, and the latter’s son-in-law, Jamarbër Malltezi. The investigations concluded that Berisha had committed “passive corruption in collaboration” for the procedures he had followed when he was the head of the government regarding the privatization of the grounds of the former “Partizani” sports complex in the capital.
According to SPAK prosecutors, the entire illegal scheme was done to favor his son-in-law, Malltezi. The former “Partizani” complex, a property with about 26 thousand m2, in the center of Tirana, turns out to have been privatized in 2008 for $100 thousand, a price below cost for the area (less than $4/m2). After privatization, construction businessman Fatmir Bektashi, under accusations of “active corruption”, built 17 towers there, constructions carried out during Berisha’s two terms in office, 2005-2013.
The most important sports complex of the “Partizani” club was owned by the Ministry of Defense. One of the first opponents of this privatization was the Commander of Logistics in the Armed Forces, Vladimir Qirjazi, who at that time denounced to the Chief of General Staff, Maksim Malaj, that he had not been consulted on the privatization of the complex and that the status of the property was unclear. General Qirjazi, one of the key witnesses in this file, had reflected through many letters the pressure that had been put on him to sign, including the open threat by the former Minister of Defense at that time, Gazmend Oketa. His testimonies throughout the investigation have proven the exercise of Berisha’s power in favor of his son-in-law, Malltezi, who was officially the representative of the heirs of the plot of land who sold the land to Bektashi.
At the end of the investigation, Sali Berisha was accused of “passive corruption of high-ranking state officials or local elected officials”, committed in collaboration with Jamarbër Malltezi. “In his capacity as Prime Minister of the Republic of Albania, concrete and active actions were taken in approving laws or by-laws, with the aim of adapting them to the needs that arose for the five known property-owning families, where the direct winner, among others, turned out to be his daughter’s husband, citizen Jamarbër Malltezi”, stated the official SPAK announcement after the conclusion of the investigation.
SPAK concluded that Berisha, in his capacity as Prime Minister, had taken active actions to carry out administrative controls with the aim of exerting pressure and issuing concrete orders to formalize privatization procedures in favor of his son-in-law. Malltezi, who, based on the calculations of special prosecutors, had benefited from the amount of about 5.5 million euros in the role of “mediator” between his father-in-law, the builder and the heirs.
