After two years, casinos will be back to the Albanian capital. The decision was taken by the council of ministers and was signed by the Deputy Prime Minister Erion Brace.
The area where their activity will be concentrated will be exactly the center of the capital, the area of the Bloc, and the area in front of the parliament.
The casinos will be located ”within the road restrictions, as follows: Barrikadave Street; Urani Pano Street: Dedë Gjon Luli Street; Ibrahim Rrugova Street; Boulevard Jean D’Ark and George W. Bush Street, the ruling said.
Casinos location map
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| Tirana map of where casinos will be allowed |
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| Tirana map of where casinos will be allowed |
Any legal entity or association of legal entities, local or foreign, that seeks to obtain a license in the category "Casino", must meet the minimum criteria, as follows:
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| Tirana map of where casinos will be allowed |
a) To be a joint-stock company, with headquarters in the territory of the Republic of Albania, in the object of whose activity to reflect the activity for gambling, according to the type of game that is required;
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| Tirana map of where casinos will be allowed |
b) The amount of capital must be not less than 1 200 000 000 (one billion two hundred million) ALL;
c) To declare the source of capital that will be invested for the exercise of activity in the field of "Casino";
ç) To have experience in the field of gambling;
d) Have the appropriate financial, administrative, organizational capacity and credibility of the applicant to successfully engage in such projects;
dh) To submit the property guarantee, together with the application and the conditions of sequestration of this guarantee;
e) Introduce restrictions on share ownership changes for licensees;
ë) To set up the server, in which will provide complete information on every transaction that will be performed between the subject and the players, turnover, and profit, as well as any data that will be required by AMLF regarding the development of this activity. AMLF will have real-time access to this server.
While the Chief of the Cabinet of the Democratic Party, at the same time the economic expert, Dorian Teliti said the reopening of the casinos has in essence narrow clientelist interests.
"It's a return to the crime scene. What the Prime Minister very pompously declared two years ago from the rostrum of the Assembly and from many other environments, even in your media, that he would close gambling in Albania, that he would close the casinos and the bets, he has already done step back. Where tens of hundreds of square meters of towers are being built, they are apparently being given an additional favor to have access to the casino business as well. There is no economic justification, there is no financial justification because the losses that come to the Albanian economy, welfare and the economy of Albanian families from the opening of casinos can be much greater than those taxes that they can bring to the budget", Explains Teliti.
Teliti clarifies the decision taken by the government to reopen the casinos, recalling the paradox with another decision according to which only one company will have the license to open a gambling activity.
"The government says will only give one license, then why did you make such a big map? It was not necessary to determine that the entire center of Tirana, the block area, the Pyramid area, the Parliament area, be the allowed map for the activity of casinos, while they say that they intend to open only one casino. But apparently behind that decision are hidden many other requests from friends and comrades of the Prime Minister to open other casinos. The government can not lie to the Albanian citizens...", declares Teliti.
For the DP expert, this decision has no economic benefit in the state budget, while it will economically burden Albanian families.
"At the moment we have a high level of evasion, we have a very high level of dirty money circulating, the economy of Albanian families was initially crushed by the earthquake and now by the pandemic and the most negative thing that could be done today is the reopening of casinos and gambling. In this way, even the little money that may have been left in the pockets of Albanian citizens risks being spent on unproductive activities ", says the economic expert of PD.
Teliti promises that the Democratic Party will draft a detailed plan in the gambling sector and will refuse to license a business that harms the economy of Albanian families and causes social wounds.