Press statement by Prime Minister Edi Rama after an extended two-day meeting of the government:
Prime Minister Edi Rama: Good afternoon! I would briefly comment on the marathon and extended cabinet meeting we have been traditionally holding at the end of a session and ahead of the next session to openly discuss and debate over various pressing issues.
The meeting took stock of the accomplishments, but looking at the achievements, not from the perspective of the past, but from the perspective of the future, and discussed the need to reorganize the entire governing process, with the process starting with the very government seat and I think we have yielded some useful results and set some important milestones so that we can start the new session with a fresh impetus, as well as with a significant increase in the governing capacities, further strengthening the role of deputy ministers, but also including heads of other important agencies in the decision-making process.
In the meantime, we will build a new channel of interaction with local and foreign expertise, from the academia, the international organizations, as well as individuals with laudable expertise.
-Mr. Prime Minister, given that the cabinet meeting was held behind closed doors, the information we have obtained is the one you have already published on social media, but what has actually attracted the media attention has been an expression you have personally used, namely “self-reformation.” Does this expression perhaps mean a self-reformation also of the cabinet, given that you have somehow already launched within the Socialist Party with the dismissal of the party’s Secretariat. Will such a reformation happen in the government too?
PM Edi Rama: We always tend to correlate reforms with individuals, with persons, their discharge and appointment, but self-reformation is much broader than that and this is what I was talking about at the very beginning. It is about reorganization of the governing process in order to boost efficiency, to increase capacities so that faster, better and more sustainable results are achieved in view of this very important moment Albania is going through.
Today Albania is a completely different country. I think that two or three days ago you published a report, the statistics about tourism and you have seen how Albania has managed to receive almost the same number of tourists per 1000 inhabitants as Greece, something nobody could imagine just a few years ago.
Likewise, you see that Albania’s image in the world has completely changed compared to just a few years ago, while we are also seeing an unimaginable growth of the interest of foreign investors and now we are no longer talking about energy sector projects only, a sector where Albania’s credibility has increased with significant results compared to other sectors, but we are talking about leading international investors in tourism and technology, who wouldn’t consider Albania as a potential destination to expand their business just a few years ago.
Prior to coming here, I attended a meeting with a big investor in the tourism sector, whom I met not many years ago and when I told him he was invited to invest in Albania, I remember that he very politely replied he was very busy. He came to Albania most recently after asking me to visit Albania and I asked him: “Aren’t you too busy?” “I am always busy” – he said – “but I want to come to Albania before the country becomes too busy for me.” This means Albania is now experiencing a completely different situation.
However, this comes with the need for us to take another leap and figure out what are the new challenges due to such change happening right before our eyes and figure out how many things we still need to make available in terms of the governing capacities to take Albania to the heights of our vision by 2030.
We are on the eve of yet another important development in the field of energy, regarding the country’s natural resources. I can’t elaborate, because it is something still confidential, but you will soon see for yourselves, if not in the coming weeks, that we will find ourselves in a completely different situation. What do I mean by this? Together with the good news comes the responsibility for us to build other capacities amid a new situation so that we can adapt to live up to the situation in terms of governance.
In addition to all these, we face challenges to increase the quality of the workforce and change the trajectory in some sectors. I have stated previously Albania can no longer consider its cheap labour force an advantage. It used to be an advantage during an earlier stage, but this is no longer the case and this was the topic of the debate I had with a representative of the manufacturing sector a few days ago.
We are pretty aware that the manufacturing and export sectors have been facing significant difficulty due to the appreciation of national currency Lek and depreciation of the Euro in the domestic exchange stock market, but we have consulted with some of the best international experts in this area. Let’s not forget that my economic advisor used to serve as advisor to Chancellor Merkel.
A stronger national currency at this moment is a success story, but one should also realize that a stronger Lek is also a strong wake-up call for the country’s garment industry, where one can no longer keep repeating the same thing while expecting different results. This sector should move towards a closed loop system, as we have repeatedly stated, and I am confident that the current situation will urge many companies operating in this sector to run towards the closed loop cycle, as many have already done. This way, we have tackled all the topics.
We discussed another major reform that we plan to launch in the education sector in a bid to further deepen a process as we can’t afford being unprepared in the face of all of these new circumstances amid these great demographic movements, the decline in the birth rate, various things that also happen within the world of technological developments, because, for example we, like everyone else, focused on coding and the coding programs for young people. With the artificial intelligence further developing, the developed world now faces the challenge of what it should do with this technology that could go out of game and practically a considerable part of that heralding the development where the whole world was making efforts to employ as many people as possible in that vanguard sector, it would cease working with the introduction of the artificial intelligence.
We are pressing ahead with a European integration process that envisages alignment and adoption of over 4300 laws and bylaws into the national legislation. Our capacity is to create around 60 bills a year. If you do the math, you would find out how many years such a process would take. Other countries have gone through such a situation previously before joining the EU and they have addressed this issue by allocating major financial support and employing a huge number of experts, as well as a countless number of translators and incredible huge paperwork. But we now live in a completely different time. With the artificial intelligence help we can complete this law transposition within a much faster time and at much lower cost.
We discussed the public procurement procedures. We are quite aware that public procurement processes are still controversial despite significant improvements compared to the past. However, they still cause distress, injustice and they influence a significant part of the public’s perception about the country, as well as the opinion of the institutions and officials tasked with overseeing and compiling reports about the country’s progress.
With the artificial intelligence solutions we would be able to completely overhaul the public procurements process. We have already launched a reform of public procurements. A draft law on public procurements is currently undergoing a public consultation process and it is designed to completely change the procurement system regardless of artificial intelligence, but with artificial intelligence we will take this process to a completely different level.
We are also transforming the government portal e-Albania. At the start of the post-vacation session you would see how e-Albania will communicate with the citizens. The web-based platform will communicate similarly like ChatGPT chatbot, and therefore the e-Albania’s helpdesk will no longer be needed. Every citizen will be able to access e-Albania through assistance of the artificial intelligence just as if he or she was to be accompanied by someone behind the screen, providing real-time communication for everyone seeking to obtain a certain licence or any public service. So we plan to introduce the co-governance into this process and I am confident we will be able to allow users of the e-Albania portal to obtain various public services through the assistance of a virtual voice that mimics a human conversationalist, meaning that users would no longer need to use a computer keyboard to write and fill the portal’s sections, but they would access facetime and communicate with a virtual assistant, who will guide users what to do in order to obtain services. Such a process will then expand to other sectors. A similar artificial intelligence project is already underway for the justice system that will significantly assist the justice system to enhance transparency, inform the public, the media and the individuals involved in the justice system, including lawyers, as well as suspects, so that they are armed with another tool that ensures more objectivity in the justice rulings.
In a nutshell, there are a plethora of things that are being explored, but all these processes definitely need the human power, the improved human resources and building up human resources and capacities as part of the governing process is a top priority.
– At the Socialist Party’s Assembly meeting three days ago, you fired almost the entire party leadership. However, what attracted attention was the dismissal of the Secretary General Damian Gjiknuri. Was he dismissed because of his inclusion in the famed incinerators case?
PM Edi Rama: If our decisions were to be driven by speculations or rumours over who is included in an investigation process, I don’t know whether there would be anyone who is going to escape without being smeared. But I am saying that although we have already clearly stated our position to justice and I have made it clear through the report presented at the latest Assembly meeting, the removal of the entire secretariat of the Socialist Party has nothing to do with the speculations about Damian. Damian has done his best job since results of his job have spoken for themselves and for the Socialist Party. We have seen how other politicians have sought to find causes outside themselves and that’s why they are right there where they are. We have always looked at ourselves, we have always asked for more from ourselves and we have always aimed high. Everything else is pure speculation I tend to ignore, because the relation of this political party and this government to the justice system is very clear. The decisions are made in order to take the party’s performance to a whole new level.
– Mr. Rama, since we are near the Drino river banks, part of the bigger Vjosa River, ReportTV has frequently reported on the pollution and urban waste disposal in the areas around and along this river, which is a national asset. However, no initiative has been launched to address the waste treatment in this area to date. I would like to recall the fact that the waste from the towns of Memaliaj, Tepelena, Përmet or any other area is treated…
PM Edi Rama: It is not about the urban waste alone, but also sewage. We are pretty aware of that. Let me first tell you that Albania has never been cleaner than today, and one should not forget Albania is seeing a staggering number of tourists this year. However, despite the mass tourism and incredible increase in the number of tourists – which is also accompanied by an increase in waste – I think you have all noticed that the cleanliness prevails this year too. And this is a great pleasure for me and it is the indisputable merit of the Minister of Tourism and the Environment, who is overseeing this whole process, day and night, and she receives real-time information about cleaning operations. The foreign tourists say they are really impressed by the clean environment.
As far as Vjosa River is concerned, I would openly state that the Vjosa River wouldn’t have been declared a National Park if it was not for the Tourism Minister’s perseverance, who also happens to be a lawmaker representing this constituency. The decision to declare Vjosa River a national park includes projects to tackle waste treatment and sewerage systems rehabilitation and these projects certainly require funding. To this end, we are currently drafting the design for the first reception centre and the projects I just mentioned. We enjoy significant support from the international partners with whom we have joined forces to turn Vjosa into a national park and the situation will definitely change soon.
Local government authorities face no penalties for the waste disposal on the banks of Vjosa River. Would the situation be like this if the government was to intervene earlier?
PM Edi Rama: Again, one can condemn and criticize local government authorities for the fact that sewage flows into Vjosa, but I don’t know any way that sewage can be diverted unless investment is made to divert it. The financial capacities of the local government are not sufficient to cope with such a project and that’s why we have forged an alliance to co-fund transformation of the national park. The same goes for the urban waste and you should also highlight the negative contribution of certain individuals to the area’s pollution.
The individuals polluting the environment are sent to prison, whereas local government authorities face no penalties whatsoever. These are double standards.
PM Edi Rama: Both fortunately and unfortunately, nobody has been imprisoned for littering or for failing to pay the electricity bill in Albania. Nobody has been imprisoned for failing to pay the utility bills. The ones to end up in prison are those who have stolen electricity.
As far as those responsible for littering are concerned, this is a process and the transformation is quite obvious in this process, which will go on and people will definitely change their attitude and habits. However, I would like to avail myself of this opportunity to comment on those responsible for starting forest fires. I would like to publicly thank the State Police for arresting some of the arsonists behind certain forest fires and such individuals face long prison sentences pursuant to the Criminal Code. I also like to call on prosecutors in the Republic of Albania – who in a criminal way have dismissed cases against individuals suspected of causing devastating forest fires – not to forget their grandchildren and not to forget their parents and grandparents, who have planted such trees, when they make such criminal decisions to cease investigations into such criminals who should be sent to jail and stay behind bars for a long time as they burn down priceless assets of the country and I don’t want Albania to face devastating fires like the ones that have swept other countries in the region. Stiffer penalties will be introduced in the Criminal Code against arsonists.
Thank you!
