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OPINEWS

Edi Rama leaves the country

Politiko 2026-10-15 10:47:03
Edi Rama leaves the country

Vincent Yusui Van Gerwen Oei
 

As I watched the student protests against the government yesterday, which marched from the Ministry of Education to the Ministry of Economy, the Ministry of Justice, and the Parliament offices opposite the Prime Minister’s Office, one thing that struck me was how completely defenseless all these buildings were. One after another, the protesters entered them, emptied them, looted them, and set them on fire. In none of the cases did a single civil servant, security guard, or police officer block their entry — as if they had been empty the entire time.

In contrast, when protesters threatened to enter the Toptani Center, the large shopping mall next to Parliament — designed by MVRDV, one of the architectural studios at the center of the Albanian Files scandal — they were swiftly repelled by just two security guards, while within seconds large police forces appeared to protect the property.

The difference was symbolic: state property is left unprotected, while the oligarch's property is protected.

This image of an abandoned state apparatus, emptied of corruption, nepotism and organized crime, was further reinforced by Prime Minister Edi Rama himself. After a day of total silence as protests swept Tirana, he decided to address the nation not from any of the government buildings or his office, but from a burnt-out mint-colored concrete cube designed by MVRDV and located next to the Pyramid — as if the most painful consequence of the protests was not the destruction of his three ministries, but the damage suffered by one of his cherished architectural projects.

It should also be noted that the cube housed the promotion office of the College of Europe, which itself continues to be rocked by a corruption scandal and the subsequent departure of Rama’s ally, Federica Mogherini. The choice of this particular location — and it is debatable whether it was burned down by protesters or as part of a fake operation organized by the government itself — is, of course, an attempt to gain EU support while its police forces rape, injure, and maim high school and university students with impunity, in most cases starting the violence that then spread throughout the capital.

And, instead of visiting any of the state educational institutions, which his government has left without necessary funding for decades and where anger against his policies has been building since he crushed the 2018 student protests, he addresses Albanian students from this dilapidated office of the College of Europe — a foreign educational institution swimming in money and that has no connection to Albanian reality: without reflection on itself, disconnected from reality and with illusions about the possibilities it has left.

The property of the oligarch is protected more than public property.

The damage to a promotional office of the College of Europe is lamented more than the dismantling of the entire public education system.

All of this also shows how fundamentally broken Rama’s propaganda machine has become. Mayor Erion Veliaj’s call centers and army of virtual robots: gone. His spin doctor, Endri Fuga: with other “projects.” His advisor, Engjëll Agaçi: on the run from SPAK. His government, reformatted for the millionth time, is scraping the bottom of the barrel. When a rogue former deputy minister of education arrives to lead the security and intelligence forces, it becomes clear that there was no other credible alternative.

I just heard that the plenary session of Parliament scheduled for today has been canceled for fear of further student protests — precisely when the parliamentary debate on what should happen next, i.e. a democratic process, would be essential. In other words, after the ministries, the Parliament has now been abandoned.

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