The road to reforming local government is still long

Senior municipal officials taking part in the Local Governance Academy training programme held separate meetings at central and local institutions in the Republic of Albania; more specifically, in discussions with Mr Erion Veliaj, Mayor of Tirana, and Mr Enea Hoti, chief adviser to the Minister of Local Affairs, they spoke about the local government reform process in the Republic of Albania and Tirana’s model of governance.

At the meeting between the Director of the KLGI Institute, Mr Besnik Tahiri, and the Mayor of Tirana, Mr Erion Veliaj, particular emphasis was placed on the challenges facing local government, innovative opportunities for advancing urban centres in both Kosovo and Albania, and the process of drafting the law on Prishtina. Speaking about the form of organisation and functioning of Tirana, it was said that the law on Prishtina has a real opportunity to include elements of functional organisation based on the Tirana model, with an emphasis on aspects related to administrative units and functional zones, so that strategic and development policies can be segmented.

Given that the municipality is the first hand of the state, the first service of government comes through the Municipality. So a state’s achievements depend directly on the success of the Municipality as an institution. In a word, the state is strong only when the municipality is strong. It is clear that the challenges in local governance are great, starting with the gap between the laws and their implementation in practice, and the lack of capacities for economic development and for strategic planning and implementation, the two basic preconditions for raising the quality of services and increasing citizens’ well-being.

It was concluded that despite the advancement of local governance, the road in terms of reform is still long. And on the road of a reform process we need planning and implementation capacities and, above all, administrative capacities.