A-Infos (en) Italy, UCADI, #210 - Albania between regime crisis and renewal (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

The so-called Pink Flamingo Revolution, which from May 31st until 6 pm, 
has been animating Albanian squares, particularly Scanderbeg Square, 
where crowds gather daily to protest the plundering of the country by 
international investors, aided by a corrupt and colluding political 
class, who seek to exploit its tourism resources and devastate the 
region . It has been especially surprising in Italy, where we are 
accustomed to viewing the population of neighboring countries as 
eternally hungry, dominated by powerful criminal organizations, and 
applying all those clichés that create a generalized judgment on 
immigrants, ignoring the fact that Albanians have been in Italy not 
since the historic landing from the Vlora River in Bari on August 8, 
1991, but for 500 years, where they have built perfectly integrated 
communities and fought in the wars of the Risorgimento.
But today's Albania is something more complex than that, deserving of 
our attention. To fully understand what is happening, we must consider 
its development and the many problems plaguing the Balkans, a strategic 
area for Italy. Albania is a complex country, boasting a beautiful 
landscape, rich in archaeological sites (yet undeveloped) and natural 
beauty. It represents a coveted target for speculators from around the 
world, and is now under siege, aided by a corrupt political class, an 
inextricable network of clienteles, and a well-organized and widespread 
criminal underworld. Meanwhile, a civil society that until recently 
seemed silent and passive, and which until now has endured and fought in 
vain, divided between Edi Rama, a self-styled socialist, and Sali 
Berischa, a self-styled democrat and the eternal president of the 
eponymous party, is rebelling.

One of the many demonstrations in front of the Government headquarters

The regime, for that is what it is, is coming to an end. The change 
began suddenly, thanks to 2,000 pink flamingos, and surprised everyone, 
including the Albanian government.
With the groundwork initially paved by the approval of the law on 
cultural heritage, followed by the amendments to the law on protected 
areas in 2024, which reduced the size of protected areas, the path was 
believed to be paved for tourism development by completing the 
supporting legal framework inaugurated in 2015. This framework had 
introduced the legal status of strategic investor, intended to attract 
large-scale investments to stimulate the country's economic development, 
but in reality, it legally enabled the plundering of Albanian territory, 
handing it over to international speculation. The status of "strategic 
investor" created a system of privileges for companies and individuals, 
with special access to public lands, coastlines, tourist areas, and 
assets of public interest that, thanks to the previous Albanian 
communist regime, belonged to the population. In January 2025, Kushner 
obtained the status of "strategic investor."
Because of this law, many areas in Albania have become the subject of 
conflict and dispute, including Rrjoll, in Velipoja province, a green 
belt connecting the Buna delta with the Shëngjin dune system. Following 
amendments to the law on protected areas, tourism projects are now 
permitted, including the "Blue Borgo" resort. The lagoon overlooking the 
archaeological ruins of the city of Bhutrinto is also a source of 
protest among the population. The land on which the planned tourism 
facilities are located or are planned, when not publicly owned, belongs 
to local clans with strong and established influence in Parliament.

The stakes

Initially, the protesters took to the streets to defend the Zvërnec 
natural oasis and the adjacent lagoon from devastation and 
privatization. However, when they saw that the area had been surrounded 
by a fence preventing access and that work was proceeding within it with 
unprecedented speed and efficiency by Albanian standards, they, and not 
only Albanians, took to the streets in ever greater numbers. 
Subsequently, the protesters, men and women of all walks of life, cited 
among their reasons for protest the catastrophic state of education, 
dominated by state-funded private initiatives, to the detriment of the 
public education system; the continuing depreciation of pensions, which 
are extremely low; the degradation of public health services to the 
benefit of private, largely funded and facilitated, providers; and 
demands for better living conditions. They also cited the construction 
of hydroelectric power plants such as those in Zall Gjoçaj, Kurdari, 
Thirrë, and Skavica, which are devastating the country. They denounced a 
system of government based on the power of an economic oligarchy that is 
part of the political system, organized crime, and the manipulations of 
political and clientelist clans, who systematically channel consensus 
across the country through vote theft. A glance at the electoral results 
of the parties participating in parliamentary elections reveals the 
proliferation of small political groups or personal parties that, 
representing special interests, side with the two major parties, 
demanding a high price for their parliamentary support.
Those who invest in Albania know that to do so, they need a local 
sponsor. Even international contracts for the implementation of projects 
funded by the European Union require an Albanian partner to be involved 
in the project's execution. This partner is tasked with acting as a 
mediator with the institutions, receiving a kickback on the profits in 
exchange. This management technique has led to the failure of projects 
to enhance archaeological sites such as Apollonia and Bylis, and leaves 
Bhutan in a worrying state of decay, where an unbearable stench emanates 
from the toilets built on the Acropolis, while the small museum is 
flooded with sewage. Edi Rama, along with the opposition, is one of the 
main perpetrators of this system, and the main beneficiary.
For years, the two cronies, he and Berischa, have happily divided up 
Albania between them, alternating power. At the end of the day, Rama 
emerged as the more solid and unscrupulous one, the one who managed to 
secure a series of connections, not least with Giorgia Meloni, whom he 
stubbornly pays homage to, bowing to her arrival in Albania, hosting her 
on vacation, and granting part of Albanian territory to build the 
monstrosity of the Shëngjin and Gjadër hotspots, a place of detention 
for repatriates. He believes that in a few years, in 2030 to be precise, 
Albania is expected to join the European Union, and then everything will 
have to be reconsidered. Rama unscrupulously believes that detaining 
migrants on behalf of Meloni is a price worth paying and is in Albania's 
best interests.
What Rama failed to realize was Albania's strategic position in the 
Balkans, its coastline guarding the Strait of Otranto, the ambitions of 
many rising powers, first and foremost Turkey, with whom he has flirted 
for years, to establish themselves in Albania, and the strategic role of 
capital investments in a country that, by establishing itself and 
generating profits, ties it to interests that will then be defended 
militarily. In an increasingly militarized world, Edi Rama believes he 
is being cunning and playing a crucial role in the future, challenging 
balances of power in the Balkans.
In his own small way, he too, like Israel, with whom he does business 
and supports, aims for a greater Albania, aware of Kosovo's 
institutional fragility and well aware that he needs solid alliances to 
aspire to annex it to the Albanian area. For this reason, faced with the 
crisis of his political power, he fuels the myth of a conspiracy and 
Greek claims over southern Albania-historical claims, certainly, but 
currently completely unrealistic.
There's a good chance that a game bigger than Rama is being played in 
Albania, and that he and his government will end up being the 
sacrificial victims of broader geostrategic policies that Rama 
absolutely does not control and will never be able to control.
With greater awareness than he, the Albanian population seems to have 
begun to grasp the situation their country faces, at the crossroads 
between growing Turkish influence, long entrenched in the country, and 
the demands of an increasingly invasive and rapacious European Union. 
The European Union, for its part, has absolutely no policy for the 
Mediterranean, but is obsessed with confrontation and conflict with 
Russia and aspires to expand eastward in the hope of colonizing a Russia 
fragmented by the conflict with Ukraine, which is supposed to provide it 
with desperately needed energy and raw materials. Albania is a flea in 
the European landscape and can be crushed at any moment, as it has been 
throughout history: Rama should know this, but he is foaming at the 
mouth at the prospect of lucrative profits. This obsession is driving 
him mad and will plunge him into the abyss.

GL

https://www.ucadi.org/2026/07/23/albania-tra-crisi-di-regime-e-rinnovamento/
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