In the Elektra cinema building, there will be a passage with shops, possibly a marketplace

Plzeň, October 2 - There are questions surrounding the recently commenced extensive reconstruction of the Elektra cinema building in the center of Plzeň. The space will most likely no longer serve as a cinema or a multicultural facility, as hoped by the Plzeň city hall. A passage with shops is being constructed in the building, which will most likely become a Vietnamese market, a city hall official said to ČTK. The change in the use of the building, where workers are modifying the interior spaces according to a building permit from 1998, was also confirmed by Jiří Mužík, the secretary of the third city district.
According to him, today the state building supervision workers discovered during an inspection of the building that the construction was permitted nine years ago. Although, as Mužík said, the validity of the building permit is unlimited if the owner commences construction within two years. "We are determining when the construction was commenced. Some work may have started a year, two, or more ago. It is enough for a part of the construction and associated spaces to be initiated, and it is considered commenced," he said.
Officials from the central district are expected to evaluate the situation within a week. "Only then will the office say whether everything is proceeding as it should. What purposes, specifically if it will serve as a Vietnamese market, the building will serve, cannot be deduced from the documentation," Mužík added. ČTK was unable to contact the building's owner or tenant.
Last March, the representative of the building's owner, the Prague company Waldemoore, Jana Janouškovcová, stated that the building would function as a multipurpose cultural center. The representative of the operator of both cinemas, Luboš Vála from Astra Cinema Elektra, mentioned that the investments in renovations would range from tens of millions to several hundred million Czech crowns. Both excluded that Elektra would serve purposes other than as a center of entertainment.
The Elektra cinema, which was the second largest in the Czech Republic with 750 seats after the Zlín cinema, last screened a film in March 2006. Its decline was accelerated by the opening of the eight-screen CineStar multiplex. Just this April, the Finále festival was held there, for which the organizers issued 22,500 tickets. The building also included a Minikino with 42 seats.