SP: The pyramid schemes must return the deposits
Socialists analyse the pyramid schemes for the first time. SP: The pyramid schemes must return the deposits. The government must take measures to prevent the owners from fleeing Albania. The pyramid schemes enter the SP agenda. After several weeks of open debate about Albanian borrowing companies, some of which are showing signs of bankruptcy, the Socialist Party has decided to take a position. The SP’s Economic Department, which met yesterday, reviewed the events so far involving the pyramid schemes and decided to issue an appeal to the government, calling for the laws governing these companies to be enforced and for their activities to be transparent. Anastas Angjeli, a department member, told the press yesterday that the state should ensure that clients get back at least the money they deposited, without the profit percentages. The companies’ transparency has already been discussed by parliament, which has appointed a commission to investigate them. But in addition to this, the SP has called for the law to be enforced, without, however, mentioning any specific law. What mattered most to the Socialists was ensuring the money of the majority of Albanians who had put it into these companies. According to them, this must be done by the Government, whose duty is to avert an economic catastrophe if the companies go bankrupt. In this way, the Socialists are mocking the fact that this year, according to official sources, left a 260-million-dollar hole in the state budget. The SP has not expressed—and has declined to express—an opinion on whether the activities of the borrowing companies are legitimate, but has decided to wait for the Government’s investigation. The Socialists have observed that many Albanians have put all their wealth into these companies, and that failure to guarantee their money would mean financial ruin for them. According to the SP, those in power bear primary responsibility for the fate of Albanians’ money in the borrowing companies, since up to now they have used the pyramid schemes as a means of gaining electoral advantage. Thus, the SP Economic Department, now headed by Bufi, has decided to maintain its position, which has been summed up in an assessment of the pyramid-scheme situation. An assessment, but no proposal for a way out of a crisis expected to hit everyone, regardless of party membership. The SP has seen no other way out of the world of pyramid schemes apart from enforcing the law. At yesterday’s meeting, the Socialists also stressed that they have no doubts about the legitimacy of the money in the pyramid-scheme companies, but would speak more precisely on this after a full investigation. Although the SP spent much of yesterday examining the economic situation created by the accumulation of money in borrowing companies, it took no position on the recommendations sent by the International Monetary Fund and other international bodies. The IMF has made its next cooperation plan with Albania conditional, placing the Albanian Government before a simple choice: continued cooperation or pyramid schemes. The SP has expressed great concern about the serious situation facing some of the companies and has identified preventing their owners from leaving Albania as one possible solution. This unofficial confirmation came from one of the party’s Economic Department members. That is how the meeting of the Economic Department—the first for the SP—ended. Since the beginning of October 1996, when the IMF called for the “closure of pyramid companies,” the Socialists had given no official opinion on the pyramid-scheme situation in Albania. It seems they thought this would help them better preserve the dwindling number of votes they received on 20 October. K.J