Controversial DUI official and businessman Ramiz Merko, who is ending his term as Mayor of Struga next year, plans to hire 73 new staff in 2025. At the same time, the small lakeside city will see only 8 retire. This move will bring the total number of employees to 280 – more than the much larger city of Bitola, which has 140 employees.

The question is whether there are enough chairs in the city hall for these hundreds of employees to sit? The public debt of the city will grow to a megalomaniacal size and citizens are not receiving the corresponding services. The administration can’t even translate official documents into Albanian, said Lulzim Nasufi from the Alliance of Albanians.

VMRO-DPMNE accused Merko, who was placed on a US black list, of expanding the number of municipal employees in order to hire partisan loyalists before th coming elections, where he is unlikely to be the DUI candidate again.