Workers protest, request cancellation of the decision on cement

The workers of "Besimi Commerce" company and its 150 contractors, together with their trucks and sirens activated, stood in front of MTI from 11:00 to 12:00, requesting from minister Kusari also from Prime Minister Hashim Thaçi, to cancel this decision, which according to them has no economic justification and which is threatening the existence of different companies, also is threatening the loss of vacancies.

Hyzer Gashi, owner of the company "Besimi Commerce", said that taking of this decision by the Minister Kusari, is unfair and anti-economic. According to him such a decision harms the importer companies, whose existence is impossible.

"Making a wrong, anti-economic decision, which harms us, the ministry considers as defense, in fact, that measure has been taken to create a privilege, for the only Greek producer who created a monopolistic position, "Sharr Cem" privatized by "Titan Group". I think that our reasons are real, our reaction is economic, as this pain caused to us by this decision, this loss has made us to inform the public of Kosovo and the economic community, that this measure is uneconomic, and has not to do with protection, but has to do with advantage of one pair and disadvantage of another one. So we as participants and as importers, at the moment I do not feel as an importer because I purchase cement in Fushë Kruja, as 'SharrCem' and Fushë Kruja are two factories in our region and national space, "he said.

M.ZEKA

According Gashi, a month, since taking this decision, there is zero import cement in Kosovo. He said that despite his request to meet with Minister Mimoza Kusari, such a thing was impossible, as Minister Kusari did not have time and did not consider as reasonable to sit and talk with them for this problem. Gashi further stated that if the decision is not withdrawn, the Kosovo budget will lose millions of euro of VAT paid on imports of goods, there will be aconsecutive bankruptcy of companies and about 1500 workers are at risk of becoming unemployed.

According to him, such a decision, also will influence the decrease in construction investment, which is currently one of the industries in Kosovo that employs a great number of people. He also said that such decisions seriously harm relations between Albania and Kosovo.