TIRANA, Sept. 14 /ATA/ – Prime Minister Edi Rama on Monday criticised remarks by special court judge Engert Pëllumbi over judicial salaries, saying judges should not claim they were entitled to money they had “collected themselves.”
Rama was responding on social media platform X to comments by Pëllumbi in a recent television interview that there was enough money to increase judges’ salaries from funds confiscated annually by Albania’s Special Anti-Corruption Court (GJKKO) from organised crime.
“No judge can ever speak like this,” Rama said, arguing that state revenues and confiscated assets belong to the state treasury rather than to the institutions that collect or confiscate them.
He compared such a claim to tax officials, customs officers, police and inspectors demanding money they had collected through taxes and fines, asking what would then remain for teachers, doctors, soldiers and others employed by the state.
Rama also criticised what he described as a salary increase being sought without a legal basis, saying that if approved, a newly appointed judge would earn 3.8 times more than a teacher, doctor or military officer, equivalent to a salary 280% higher.
“Those higher up, you cannot even imagine how much more they would get,” Rama added.
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