Ever since his electorial victory during the general elections of May, Prime Minister Edi Rama has been running an extended victory lap to further assert his power across all levels of Albanian society – or, perhaps more accurately, impose his will. The concomitant display of groveling bureaucrats, abject resignation letters, and public shows of servility would have been an embarrassment to any country that deigns itself a functioning democracy with a healthy rule of law. But, alas, those are in ever shorter supply these days.
On July 11, a Friday, Rama launched his campaign with an ultimatum announced in front of the assembled mayors of the country that by Monday all deputy mayors and directors would have to be gone. It goes without saying that such a demand widely oversteps the mandate of a Prime Minister and directly violates the autonomy of local government, but this is of course the point: Rama’s discretionary powers should reach the all levels of national and local administration.
Rama’s demand was immediately followed by a “wave of resignations.” Remarkably, these were reframed by the municipalities themselves as organic forms of auto-critique. For example, when firing both deputy mayors and fourteen directors, the Municipality of Kukës claimed that this decision was taken “after a thorough analysis of the performance of the structures on the ground, where significant shortcomings have been identified in several sectors serving the citizens.” The absurdity of a “thorough analysis” completed during a single weekend is obvious, but clearly shows the depths at which the will of the national leader is metabolized as local agency. And when the mayor of Konispol refused to follow Rama’s order, he was immediately required to resign.
In a way, this was a logical development from what had already transpired in Tirana earlier this year, where Rama in practice had usurped the role of mayor, as evidenced by the “working meeting” he organized with municipal civil servants on February 20, after Mayor Erion Veliaj’s arrest on corruption charges. Appointed after two visits of Rama to the municipality on February 11, Deputy Mayor Anuela Ristani publicly wished him “a happy return to the Tirana team.” These words were later echoed by Rama himself: “During the elections, for the first time I was part of the Tirana team.”
The enforced – to use Rama’s term – “refreshment” of local government was accompanied by the announcement of further consolidation of traditionally municipal functions under the national control, by the creation of national corporations for water and waste management. Considering the fact that these two functions historically have provided local authorities with some level of autonomy with regards to providing plum jobs to supporters and facilitating various corruption schemes, this consolidation effectively deprives them of important levers to exert their power inside their municipality. Key appointments at municipal level will henceforth come from the national top.
In a further intrusion into municipal autonomy Prime Minister Rama also launched a campaign to “free public spaces” from “illegal” constructions and terraces which had encroached on walkways and pavements across the country, setting an arbitrary deadline of July 31. Again, we recognize this initiative to “create space where there appears to be none” from his time as Mayor of Tirana in the early 2000s and his first term as prime minister, and it provides him with a very visible way of asserting his authority across the Albanian territory. The message is clear: even though the management of public space is largely a municipal competency, only the Prime Minister can “free” this space in the name of public interest, heroically battling the “significant shortcomings” of local bureaucrats. Historical precedents for such campaigns in which the great leader sides with the people against local bureaucrats in order to cement his own power are of course well attested.
Also the nominally independent judiciary, even though now nearly completed vetted according to a reform that he himself championed, has once again become the target of Rama’s ire, directed in particular at judges pulling the breaks on his attempts to “liberate” public space. And when the High Judicial Council (KLGj) released a carefully worded statement emphasizing the rule of law and the separation of powers, calling upon all “public and private subjects” to refrain from attacking the judiciary, Rama responded: “Let me tell the members of the KLGj not to waste their time on judging how I do the work for the Albanian people have elected me.” In other words, “my popular mandate trumps your rule of law.”
But Rama gave perhaps his most impressive display of authority to date recently, on September 11 at the National Assembly of Rama’s Socialist Party in the soon-to-be-destroyed Palace of Congresses in Tirana. Rather conveniently, a day prior the Special Anti-Corruption Prosecution (SPAK) had officially indicted Veliaj, which opened the way for his removal from office and local elections, allowing Rama to announce the PS candidate – and, barring some type of miracle, the future mayor of Tirana.
The announcement comes directly at the beginning of Rama’s 2.5-hour speech. The video, posted on Rama’s official YouTube channel, starts with a bird’s eye view of the assembled party delegates. The moment they start applauding, Rama gets up at the top of the screen, first row, directly to right side of the center isle, and walks up to the stage. The camera then cuts from a wide frontal shot to a focus shot as the party leader starts to speak.
After invoking the rain as herald of the blessings for the work to enter the European Union by 2030, we cut briefly to applauding cadres and a shot focusing on éminance grise Gramoz Ruçi. “But,” Rama continues, “we have to address immediately here the emergency…” – and here the camera cuts to a steely-faced Ogerta Manastirliu, dressed in a blue blazer, uncomfortably wedged between Rama’s empty seat and the blank stare of Speaker of Parliament Elisa Spiropali – “…created in the leadership of Tirana, for reasons that are known worldwide.”
But rather than addressing said “emergency,” Rama creates a theatrical tension by launching into an extended exposition on the Justice Reform and the independence of the judiciary, for which he takes full credit, while at the same time using his bully pulpit to continue his assault against the very judiciary he claims to have liberated. Throughout his discourse, he speaks of the post-Justice Reform judiciary as a “child” that needs to “grow,” even though it grows “much slower.” He urges his party members to maintain a “state-building, strategic patience.” It is the burden of the Socialist Party to carry this “stone on our backs,” even if “diseases of yesteryear” have infected the child.
Even on behalf of those who we feel have been prosecuted unjustly, Rama continues – without ever explicitly naming Veliaj – we must not intervene, for the sake of “the Albania of the next generation”: “This party is the only guarantor for [the judiciary’s] independence.” Or, formulated differently, Edi Rama, as the head of the Socialist “family,” is the one who grants and withdraws that independence; it is by his grace and “great strategic patience” that Veliaj is currently allowed to be indicted, despite what Rama claims to be a procedure “in open violation of the law […] which doesn’t happen any democratic country. The most open, flagrant, brutal violation in a total abuse of office.”
For anyone with some healthy political intuition – whether they are politicians, oligarchs, or drug traffickers –, this is a rather unpleasant situation. If SPAK and the Special Anti-Corruption Court are – at least in appearance – off limits as Rama claims, then being involved with this government, as official or client, exponentially becomes more high-risk. Because the implication is that only one person in this entire system is untouchable. And Manastirliu is well aware of this, as Rama sketches, in vivid colors, her political future – her unjust imprisonment against which we unfortunately will not be able to do anything for the sake of this country’s next generation – in his lengthy “parenthesis.”
And so, more than twenty minutes after the camera first cut to her unmoving death mask, Rama finally annouces that “Ogerta Manastirliu is the person Tirana needs today.” Applause. Cut back to Manastirliu, who looks as if she is on the verge of tears – though not from joy or gratitude. Spiropali gives her brief glance, trying to gauge Manastirliu’s mood, but quickly turns back to Rama once she understands the reality. Rama gazes at Manastirliu. She tries to stare back but keeps shifting her eyes restlessly back and forth between the leader and the void. “I will never forgive you, see you in hell,” fleets through her frozen mind. As Rama continues by listing her numerous accomplishments in public service her mouth droops further as her shoulders buckle under the stones the leader keeps piling on her back.
“Dear Ogerta,” Rama adds with just the slightest hint of a devilish grin, “I know you won’t easily forgive me, maybe for an even longer period this time, this unannounced bomb…” – Spiropali revels visibly in the cruelty – “…but Albania needs Tirana as the train needs the locomotive, and the Socialist Party needs Tirana for the servicing of its own locomotive. […] It’s your turn now, dear Ogerta, to lead Tirana.” A profile shot of Manastirliu, staring into the light rushing at her from the end of the tunnel.
