Buildings 1 and 21 damaged by the earthquake in Kombinat are the next to win the case in court in front of the municipality of Tirana.
The Administrative Court overturned the decisions of the municipal council of Tirana that on November 24, 2021 determined the demolition of two buildings, bringing to six the total number of buildings for which the residents have won the court battle.
The court annulled these decisions, together with the technical opposition of the act-expertise.
"Contradictory acts of expertise"
After the November 26 earthquake, building no. 1 at the Combine underwent a series of technical checks.
According to the lawyer who defended the building in court, four expertises were carried out, three of which determined that the building belongs to the DS2 category.
"One from a private studio which did the verification and expertise of our building and where it came to the conclusion that the building has no structural damage. A second expertise was made by a group of foreign, Israeli, Hungarian engineers, who also carried out the expertise of our building and found that the building has no structural damage. A third expertise was made in May 2020 by engineers of the Institute of Construction, who also found that the constructions in the building are of a low level, which were categorized according to categories from DS1 to DS5, at the DS2 level.- explains the lawyer.
The third expertise, May 2020 from the Construction Institute
This category according to the approved normative act 9/2019 "For Coping with the Consequences of Natural Disasters" and the decision of the Council of Ministers no. 634, belongs to the light degree of damage, according to which residents receive a fund of lek depending on the damage for the reconstruction of the apartment.
Referring to this categorization, the residents received a grant for the reconstruction of the building.
"On the basis of these findings, the residents of the building, 17 applicant families who had the opportunity to apply because the rest were emigrating and did not have the opportunity, applied to the municipal unit, to the "housing" portal, where according to the categorization that was done to the building, it resulted in DS2 , we benefited from the bonus of the building reconstruction grant in the amount of 1 million 750 thousand old lek. A lot that we have received", the lawyer argues.
At the moment when the residents thought they had finished the relationship with the Albanian state, after receiving the reconstruction grant, they saw their building on another list that would include it in a fourth expertise.
In December 2020, the municipality of Tirana announced a tender to carry out the act-expertise for objects that had suffered category DS4 and DS5 damage. Union of Economic Operators "Atelier 4" & "Archimed SPS" shpk & "Kejsi 05" shpk. were declared winners of the Tirana Municipality tender to perform the expertise act for building no. 1 in Kombinat.
"It turned out to us that in December 2020 the municipality of Tirana had announced a tender to carry out expertise on the buildings that had severe DS4 and DS5 damage. But in the list that the directorates within the municipality had forwarded from civil emergencies to the directorate that carried out the tender, it turned out that the tender contract included buildings that were neither DS4 nor DS5, but included DS2s, including our building", - explains the lawyer of building no. 1.
Studio Atelier 4, contracted by the Municipality of Tirana to carry out the expertise, drew up another report, which it started for opposition at the Institute of Construction, while the latter approved it.
According to the lawyer of the residents of building no. 1, this expertise was carried out without going to the field.
"This was the fourth check, but not done. Done on paper, but not done on the ground. The act that Dhimitre Papa has made for the cataloging of damages does not correspond at all with the previous expertises and does not correspond at all with the situation of our palace. They used the copy-paste model, to use it in all those buildings".
According to some technical conclusions, act-expertise prepared by engineer Dhimitër Papa concluded that the palace "does not meet the safety and stability conditions for dynamic seismic loads".
"Expertise without going to the field?"
Residents argue that the report drawn up by Studio Atelier contains falsified elements.
"The first falsified element was that on October 25 there was a public hearing between the residents and the group of engineers, which does not appear at all in reality, it is not documented anywhere. It was requested in an official letter that the minutes be made available to us, and there is no such minutes", - said the lawyer.
While according to him the second forgery "it was as if we, the residents of that building receive the rent bonus, which is completely untrue, that none of the residents of the building receive the rent bonus".
Compulsory local plan for the Kombinat area
This problem was raised earlier by the residents of the Combine. (read more)
According to the local plan, the development of the capital with the new arrivals, orient Tirana to return from monocentric (with one center) to polycentric (several centers), thereby promoting the extension of urban development in areas beyond the center.
With a decision of March 31, 2021, the Kombinati area has been declared a new area for development. According to the mandatory local plan, it appears that new buildings are planned to be built in this area.
Note: The lawyer quoted in the article preferred to remain anonymous
Erisa Kryeziu has completed higher studies in Journalism and Communication and Master of Science in Public Relations at the University of Tirana. She has been a journalist and project manager at Citizens.al for five years, where she reports on social issues and human rights, especially on issues of rights at work, in education, gender equality, marginalized groups, people with disabilities such as and for environmental issues. At the same time, she works as a project coordinator with a focus on youth and media education. User of new reporting techniques such as "Mobile Journalism" and citizen engagement tools in reporting (ECR-Engage Citizens Journalism).
