The Law on Strategic Investments was passed in 2015 as a temporary law to provide equal protection to both domestic and foreign investors.
The idea was that the law would remain in force until the new investment law was completed...which after almost 10 years has not yet been completed.
Strategic investor status is awarded in six sectors; but more than half of the strategic investors have benefited from this status in the tourism sector, mainly in contested projects for the construction of tourist complexes and resorts on the coast.
These investments have been offered assistance in speeding up the procedures, equipping them with the necessary permits and licenses for the realization of the investment, making available the properties of the seashore, or forest areas near the resort, the construction of auxiliary infrastructure such as: roads, electricity network, water supply, sewerage and assistance for land consolidation, which includes the registration of properties in ZVRPP or taking into use, etc.
Regarding this law, there has been criticism that it is being used by people close to politicians in the government or opposition to acquire state and private properties in the most coveted coastal areas.
But the main problems have been opened by an article of this law which says that the state can take the land from the coastal residents to put it at the service of the strategic investor.
It is Article 28 which provides that "in order to enable the development and realization of strategic investment projects, the expropriation of private real estate is allowed, if the investor has not been able to resolve the ownership of the real estate by agreement with the owner..."
So if a resident does not agree to sell his land to a strategic private investor - the state intervenes and expropriates the resident in the interest of the investor.
This has made many coastal residents who do not want to sell their land - shudder at the idea of an investor eyeing them for strategic projects.
In these conditions, when there are clashes, the residents have started to hire Greek lawyers to clash with their state because they have lost faith that they can find justice against an investor who demands their property under the warning: Either sell it to me, or the state will expropriate you. .
Beleri also used this article, which has caused massive fear in the coastal areas still untouched by development, to win Himara.
Many residents secretly admit that they are forced to declare themselves of Greek origin in order to have support in the face of the risk that the state expropriates them in the interest of strategic investors./ Dita