The routine at the counters of the Albanian courts is exactly like this day of Nezir Abdullai, who is waiting for a court date for his wife’s trial.
Hasija is an elderly woman who has not yet received her retirement pension, as she has to convince the court that she has worked in the cooperative farm, but the documents disappeared and not fault of hers.
“13 times I’ve come, looking for papers here and there. They tell me that the court is filled with files, but I cannot solve the load of files” – says Nezir Abduallai.
The number of cases accumulated in the Court of Appeal has reached 19 thousand. In these conditions where the courts are paralyzed by overload, the postulate ‘the justice delayed is justice denied’ is more relevant than ever for citizens.
They have now turned into lawyers and are filing lawsuits against the violation of the reasonable term for the trial.
This is one of dozens of lawsuits filed in court seeking expedited trial to get past the waiting list. The citizens bring to the attention of the justice system that the European Court of Strasbourg has spoken on the violation of the lawsuit deadlines, saying that Albania can be penalized for these delays.
The courts with the largest stock in Albania are the Supreme Court, the Court of Appeal and then the courts of first instance.
“It still does not come out as planned, as now are being examined cases that were registered in 2017, according to the date of registration in the Court of Appeal. We hope for the increase of staff …” – says the court employee to Neziri.
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