Author: Denis Tahiri
The student town in Vlora is on the verge of bankruptcy. And the reason for the failure is not only the expenses for the administration, but also the unpaid bills of electricity and water and at the same time the accumulated taxes. With a debt accumulated over time and passed like a baton over the years, the first signs are seen in the maintenance of the dormitories and in the Services to the dormitories. The accumulated debt up to the moment of publication of the article reaches the figure of ALL 66714597.97.
The campus that accommodates young students includes two dormitories, which were said to have been reconstructed and were ready for the new academic year. But only one of the buildings is in good condition. In the other, no intervention was performed.
" The building that has been reconstructed has 120 rooms, make no mistake, and there are only two people per room, it is better than the old one to be honest. The old one has about 45 rooms and students usually stay 2 or 3 people per room," Marjusi starts the conversation for "Sinjalizo". The student decided to live in a community with his peers. He mentions that the biggest problem in the dormitory is now directly related to maintenance.
" It was my choice to stay in the dormitory, it gives you a lot of opportunities for socialization, plus it's cheaper than renting a house, which, to be realistic, in Vlora is not that cheap, " explains the young man.
Currently, from the information provided by "Sinjalizo", about 200 students who attend the school in Vlora live in these two dormitories. The young people who were contacted by "Sinjalizo" expressed complaints about the conditions.
To whom does "Treatment of Students JSC VLORĂ" owe
To say that the total debt of an institution is 66714597.97 ALL is a big figure, but when you also show to whom these obligations are, you better understand the unprecedented situation in which an institution that provides a very important service to hundreds of youth, that of housing.
Currently, from the documents available for the "Sinjalizo" platform at ACQJ, the debts of this institution over the years can be clearly identified. An amount of ALL 24892515.38, the Vlora student treatment company owes OSHEE Vlora to OSHEE Vlora, to which the Electricity Distribution Operator has imposed a late interest which is approximately the same amount as the obligation, with a total value of ALL 23018161.69, where the total obligation to the Electricity Distribution Operator of Vlora Student Town is in the amount of ALL 47910677.07.
And as the students claim, there have been many cases of power outages. "There have been cases where the lights went out, but they came back on. We found out that it was a power outage from OSHEE, but I can't say for sure," says one of the students in this dormitory.
Meanwhile, the obligations are also high towards the Waterworks of Vlora, where the value of the obligation is 7652964.9 ALL with an interest arrears of 458235 ALL. The total debt to Vlora Waterworks is an amount of ALL 8111199.9.
But on the other hand, the long-term obligations of the Vlora student treatment company are also towards private entities. Currently, this institution owes a hydrocarbon distribution operator an amount of ALL 1512267.
In court with the municipality and unpaid employee insurance
In the list of liabilities that the Student Treatment Company in Vlora has, there are also liabilities in the tax branch in Vlora, where from March to September 2022, no liability has been paid for the employees of this company. The value of the tax liability for the employees of this institution is 3592084 ALL with a late interest of 1180451 ALL and with a total liability of 4772535 ALL.
On the other hand, this institution is in court with the Municipality of Vlora, which, if the VKM is necessary, will have the institution under its control. The cause of the lawsuit is building and property tax liabilities imposed over the years. This obligation of ALL 1956160 has been extinguished by the decision of the Administrative Court of the first instance, but its continuation remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, this institution also has obligations towards the two auditors who performed the audit for 2021, where each of them owes a figure of 360000 ALL.
The Ministry is aware of the situation
In the documents owned by "Sinjalizo", there is also a letter which is a response to a letter from the Ministry of Education, which, among other things, states that: " As you are aware, the Society, since 2019-2022, has not received approval for the Economic Development Program from the MAS. Under these conditions, the Society's weekly expenses are only the standard ones: salary + social security, energy, water, internet + mail, which thanks to our monitoring have been realized at their minimum possible. Other operational expenses from 2019-2022 have not been realized due to lack of funds, leading the Society to "beg" for chlorine somewhere and detergent somewhere for cleaning the dormitories."
On the other hand, the Ministry of Finance and Economy is also aware of this situation in which this company is located, which is also the recipient of this letter, which also specifies the obligations of the company.
Among other things, this document also states that the subsidy was not made in accordance with the Council of Ministers' Decision No. 75, dated 12.2.2018 " On the approval of the financing model of Public Institutions of Higher Education and Scientific Research, Chapter V, point 2, nor in accordance with the MFE Instruction No. 9, dated 20.03.2018 "On standard procedures for budget implementation", as amended, Chapter III, Subsidies, points 191 and 192, and consequently , nor according to the real expenses of the company sent with the relevant monthly statements (situation, invoices, payroll, etc.) ".
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Education, when officially asked about this issue, states that: " The funding amount for each company is calculated based on indicators and reports in implementation of Joint Instruction No. 7, dated 24.04.2003 "On the criteria for planning and using budget subsidies in student treatment enterprises and dormitories and canteen enterprises", as follows:
- the planned number and the actual number of students accommodated in the dormitory;
- the number of employees according to the organizational structure of the company, which must be within the limits stipulated by the joint directive of the three ministries, in the ratio of 1 (one) employee for every 11 (eleven) students;
- annual average salary according to the company's economic program project."
Students leave, dorm budgets drop
Currently in our country, the only student treatment societies that have not been taken over by the municipalities are those of Korça and Vlora. The official reason is that the necessary VKM has not yet been issued.
"The transfer of 100% of the shares of the joint-stock companies "Trajtimi i Studentëve" Vlorë and Korçë from the Ministry of Finance and Economy to the municipalities of Vlorë and Korçë is made by decision of the Council of Ministers, upon proposal of the Ministry of Finance and Economy," the Minister of Education officially tells "Sinjalizo". Meanwhile, on the other hand, unofficial sources indicate that the cause is also the debts accumulated for years by these institutions.
What stands out, the subsidy of these companies has been decreasing year after year. In 2018, the treatment of Korçë students benefited from an amount of 19,986,744 ALL as a subsidy from MAS, where the following year this figure goes to 16,846,891 ALL, marking again in 2020 another slight decrease, reaching the value of 16,415,000 ALL. Meanwhile, in 2021, the subsidy figure reaches 11,500,000 ALL, while for 2022 "Treatment of Korçë Students" has benefited a value of 6,856,078 ALL.
On the other hand, the Student City of Vlorë in 2018 benefited a value of 26,641,334 as a subsidy, while in 2022 this value is only 13,446,806 ALL. Meanwhile, the number of students is clearly smaller, where according to INSTAT, in the academic year 2017-2018, 131,833 students sat in Albanian universities, in the academic year 2022-2023, a total of 123,880 students sat in university banks.
