Speech of Prime Minister Edi Rama at the ceremony for the inauguration of the waste processing and energy production plant in Elbasan:

 

Hello everybody!

This day started very badly in Elbasan. We went to the hospital to see closely an extremely important transformation that gives all those who need dialysis the chance to finally have it in human conditions where the state respects citizens, and where citizens respect each other, after a very long period of tortures and delays, during which patients had to travel to Tirana 3 times a week, or have dialysis even after midnight due to the shortages the system had caused to this service. I was horrified to see the situation around the hospital, and to learn that a court decision has prohibited the hospital and the city hall to build a security perimeter wall. The judge had considered more appropriate that between the public interest and the interest of the people in need of health care, the interest of the medical staff to work safely in a normal safety system, and the interest of some occupiers of the public land, the interest of the latter was to be chosen.

I immediately ordered the demolition of all those buildings that have had the hospital of Elbasan taken hostage. A range of pharmacies that are part of the old and rusty chain of corruption, which we have broken in various points, but we still need to break it once and for all. And for this reason, a lot of work, a lot of hard work, a lot of patience and a lot of common energy are still required so that we can manage to make state wherever the state must exist.

I want to assure all the citizens of Elbasan that the hospital will be very soon freed from the clutches of speculators who are keeping it hostage, and I am convinced that the judge who has given that decision will be held accountable before justice, because the Vetting may be delayed but justice does not forget. Time has come for justice to be applied in this country, and for the interest of every good and honest person who abides by the rules, who makes a contribution to the state, not to be anymore a wild card in the hands of corrupt judges.

On the other hand, I’m really very pleased that this day that started so badly, is ending in such a surprising way also for me, as I have supported this project since the first day we voted it in the Council of Ministers. But I must say very honestly that, after hearing the presentation of the Minister of Environment, it seemed to me too good to be true. I told him in the cabinet meeting that he will have our support through with this, but apparently what I saw doesn’t match what I heard. Actually, not only they don’t match, but what we’re seeing goes beyond every prediction.

I’m very grateful to those who’ve worked on this project, and to those who’ve invested in it. I’m very grateful to the Ministers of Environment and Finance. Although he’s from Gjirokaster, the latter has been generous all the way, which let me assure you is not easy.

Above all, I want to give credit in a very frank manner to Qazim Sejdini, because he was the first to believe that this city could be saved from the plague, which was similar to a predetermined curse that would follow Elbasan generation after generation, that of the old field of waste that used to be burned in open air, and as a consequence the city of Elbasan and the surrounding area would become uninhabitable when the sun went down. This plague belongs now to the past.

We are here to watch closely a plant that is a meaningful example of the latest technology, as it is of course an investment for which we cannot but be proud. The parameters of this plant, all the benefits that it will bring not only to the environment, but also to the economy of the city, and the technological chain of waste processing in our region, where we were the most degraded and backward country in environmental terms, the country that until three and a half years ago coexisted with the ecological bomb of Elbasan, is now at the forefront of technological transformation. Technological transformation also in view of an environmental transformation, to end a terrible story that had transformed our environment in a space where waste has historically cracked down since the fall of the old regime. Today, your plant is one of a kind in the region.

Really, you have seen nothing yet, for this is only the beginning. I’m convinced that thanks to this fantastic example, and thanks to the fact that a very important contributor to this achievement is the Minister of Environment, the advisors of the Fier City Hall, those of the Socialist Movement for Integration party, will be now persuaded that victory doesn’t mean blocking a similar project in Fier, but rather implementing it. Therefore, I very much hope that you will be back in Fier being inspired and enthusiast, and all together we will convince the residents of Fier, especially those of the area where this project is envisaged to be built, that it doesn’t bring pollution, but it brings economy, employment and growth.

We’ll be here even after, when we will come and visit some 600 ha of ultramodern greenhouses in the plateau over there. The greenhouses will be built and will function thanks to the steam that will be created form the waste process back here. Let us not forget that 60% of the cost of hydroponic greenhouses is heating.

Meanwhile, 60 hectares of greenhouses in a municipal land, where the city hall will find its way to build them in cooperation with private enterprise, will have very low costs and will create additional jobs, they will create another economic and social development space for the whole area, and another example of the Albania we want.

This is an example to understand something which unfortunately was not understood for years in the Albania run by those who, when waste is removed, they say it’s but a show, but when they see waste stay there, they consider this normal. They have never had an aversion to waste, on the contrary they have coexisted with waste, and have ruled on top of waste. And every time an attempt was made to counter the tendency of that primitive policy in relation to waste, there were always voices crying pollution, toxins, intoxication, and even mass extinction of the population in this country.

Waste may be a disease, as it was for Elbasan until yesterday. But it may be also an asset, as it is for Elbasan today. The difference between us and those who are today in the tent, in the conditions of a greenhouse that doesn’t recycle, is that for them waste will always be a disease, whereas for us waste in this country is an asset. An asset that we will turn into a source of economy and development, and of course also into a tool to have our environment measure up with the work God did when it created Albania, a wonderful country, a miracle which the hand of man prevented from turning into a source of prosperity for the people of this country.

It is not only Fier, but there’s also Tirana that has started a new history in terms of waste management. Those for whom cohabitation with waste is a physiological need, have treated this history as a mafia history, as a criminal history, as a dark history. Actually, it is a new history that is taking Tirana, step by step, to the separate collection of waste.

The separate collection of waste is a challenge for every new municipality that has emerged from the administrative and territorial reform. Plants like this one are one more reason to make the separate collection, and to transform waste into money for the municipality and the local economy. We’re in the process to have this plant built also in Fier and in Tirana.

This is a very exciting moment because it is very exciting to see how politics, which is a force that can do bad, is also a force that can do good. What has happened is thanks to politics. It is thanks to some people who, through politics, overthrew a history that resembled a fatality for Elbasan, and they made possible to have today an urban park where until yesterday the burnt waste intoxicated every street and every house of this city. Whereas today, there’s an extraordinary example of technological, economic and social development.

This is a very strong reason for all those who are often prey of the wrong idea that we are all the same here. We wouldn’t gather here today, if we were all the same, but we would be inhaling the air of burnt waste coming from the field that would be still there.

If we were all the same, Elbasan wouldn’t be today a space where there is still a lot to do, but where the attempts to change have started yielding concrete results, by inspiring the residents of this city to look with much more hope at the future of this city.

If we were all the same, the waste of Elbasan would continue to be the disease of Elbasan.

Precisely because we are not all the same, starting from now the waste of Elbasan will be an added value to the still modest asset of Elbasan which, however today, three and a half years after we embarked on this very difficult path to make Albania revive, to make Elbasan revive, to make our cities and villages revive, has much more than it had until yesterday.

We have still a lot to do, and in order to do more, we have to keep learning more. At the end of the day, the difference between developed countries and developing countries is not what they have but what they know. There are countries that have nothing, but are rich because they know, and there are some other countries, like this wonderful country called Albania, that are poor because they don’t know.

We’ll do our best to learn and do a lot, in order to make Albania a country where, through the state we want, everybody will have a chance to work, provided that they want to live on honest work, and where for everybody’s welfare will not be a privilege, but an opportunity.

This is entirely possible.

Looking at this work today, and considering from where we started when we decided to build this plant here in Elbasan, makes us think that nothing is impossible and everything is possible.

Believe me that, if three and a half years ago I believed that it was possible to make Albania, today, three and a half years after I’m even more convinced that Albania can be made.