Albania Sacks MPs and Mayor for Hiding Convictions

Albania's Central Electoral Commission, CEC, voted on Thursday to dismiss from office two MPs and a mayor who had hid their criminal convictions after submitting forms about their past.

The chairman of the Commission, Denar Biba, announced that the seven members of the CEC had voted unanimously to remove the mandates of Shkelqim Selami, an MP from the junior government party, the Socialist Movement for Integration, LSI, and the Mayor of Kavaja, Elvis Roshi.

He also announced that the Commission had decided by a simple majority of votes to remove the mandate of Dashamir Tahiri, an MP from the opposition Democratic Party.

The decisions came after the Prosecutor General on December 20 said the two MPs and the Mayor had hidden their convictions in Italy.

A new law bans elected officials and members of the public administration from office if they do not have a clear criminal record.

The prosecution said MP Tahiri was convicted of money falsification in Italy in 1995 and of using a falsified driving license in 2009.

MP Selami had failed to declare an arrest warrant issued against him from a court in Brindisi on suspicion of being part of an organized criminal group involved in human trafficking.

Mayor Elvis Roshi had failed to declare a conviction for gang rape in 1995 in Italy. He had also not declared the use of different names in Switzerland.

After the verdicts, people took to social networks to hail the CEC decision as a sign that important laws had finally started to be implemented, even when they affected senior officials.

The US embassy in Tirana also welcomed it as important for the Albanian people, and as a warning for criminals considering whether to become candidates in the next parliamentary elections.<...