Nine million euros a year. The cost of food, accommodation and services for the 300 members of the Italian police force employed in the migrant centers in Shengjin and Gjider, Albania. An expense that includes the rental of four-star hotel facilities with accommodation in single rooms, catering and related services. Including private beach, swimming pool and spa.
Numbers that triggered the inevitable political controversy with the secretary of More Europe, Riccardo Magiwhich accuses Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of having made a mistake again “even on the detention centers for migrants in Albania”. For the AVS group leader Filiberto Zaratti in the constitutional affairs commission of the Chamber, “the affair of the CPR in Albania looms more and more every day as a national scandal wanted by the Meloni government and managed by the hand of the Minister of the Interior Matteo Piantedosi“.
The Minister of the Interior Matteo Piantedosi (Photo by LaPresse Archive)
Sources of Interior Ministry However, they explain that “the amount of 9 million euros represents the maximum estimated expenditure in the event that the entire quota of supervisory staff envisaged was used” and that “the choice of structures was made taking into account the standards indicated by the agreements trade unions”. In any case, this is a minimal expense compared to the costs of the entire Albania operation.
The numbers were provided by the Interior Minister himself Matteo Piantedosi responding to a question time in the Chamber on 16 October: “The expected allocation, which may also prove to be higher than the actual costs, refers to a period of five years and consists of 134 million euros per year”. According to the minister, this is “an investment” which will allow the costs of managing the first extraordinary reception to be lowered “which today amount to around one billion and 700 million per year”. The protocol that entrusts the housing service is valid for 12 months and was approved on August 5th.
Riccardo Magi (Handle)
The ministry further specifies that the daily cost for each individual agent is 80 euros. In total the overall expenditure is 8,897,200 euros. The contract was won by the company Raffaelo Resort in acceptance of an offer deemed “adequate and corresponding to the needs of the administration”. Before the contract was awarded, the Interior Ministry carried out a series of checks to exclude that the structures were linked to criminal environments.
The secretary of Uilpa Gennarino de Fazio (@web)
The secretary of the company also added to the controversy Uilpa penitentiary police Gennarino de Fazio: “The contracting company will make two hotels with private beach, wellness center, swimming pools and restaurant available to the operators. All this while the Ministry of Justice, penitentiary administration department, continues to keep members of the Penitentiary Police employed in the management of the penitentiary at Gjadër in prefabricated structures, in a multiple room, without the most basic furnishings”.
“Giorgia Meloni who makes mistakes with the calculator has succeeded in Albania in the feat of pitting the state police against the penitentiary police” comments the spokesperson for Green Europe and deputy of the green and left alliance, Angelo Bonelli.
