“Pasqyrë Albania”, another important project that increases transparency and strengthens citizens’ trust in the state, is ready to become operational with its full range of services.

Conceived in response to the citizens’ protest in early June, the platform introduces a new approach to the relationship between citizens and public administration by creating a single digital window where people can monitor public investments, local decision-making, applications and complaints, and contribute to improving public initiatives.

Prime Minister Rama held a discussion today with experts from the National Agency for Information Society (AKSHI) involved in configuring the platform, to take a closer look at its features and innovations.

“Pasqyrë Albania” is built around four main pillars, enabling citizens to monitor public investments and the progress of projects in their area; access decisions by municipalities and municipal councils; track the status of applications, services and complaints in real time, including the stages of their handling by the responsible institutions; and give their opinions on draft acts undergoing public consultation.

A dedicated section, “Flamingo Mirror”, focuses on projects of particular importance and matters of significant public interest, providing transparent information in response to claims and disinformation.

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Prime Minister Rama: Here we are with the outstanding young men from the National Agency for Information Society (AKSHI), who have developed another extraordinarily important project for us. It emerged from our reflections following the large flamingo protest demonstrations in early June. It was promised as an important step forward in the relationship between citizens and the state, and vice versa, to address a key issue, or more precisely, the “Achilles’ heel” of that relationship: complaints or requests getting lost in the ocean of bureaucracy. At the same time, “Pasqyrë Albania” undoubtedly includes a whole range of other elements that bring the entire state before citizens’ eyes with a single click, through a single window.

There has been intensive work, and now we have the result before us, which we will soon make accessible to the public.

The National Agency for Information Society expert: We have built “Pasqyrë Albania” around four main pillars through which citizens can obtain information on all public investments. So the aim is transparency in investments, but, as you mentioned, Prime Minister, the aim is also to allow citizens to follow their applications and complaints at every step.

The first pillar is “See”, enabling citizens to see transparently where investments are being made and what is being invested in within their municipality, and also to learn about the priority initiatives and reforms the state is implementing.

Prime Minister Rama: The idea behind this relates to that other commitment within “Pasqyrë Albania”: to provide all citizens with a tool through which they can see investments and the progress of projects in any area of interest to them. A citizen from Vlora will be able to see what is currently happening in their area, what stage projects have reached, including projects that, for one reason or another, may have been suspended, delayed and so on. This will allow citizens themselves to check every “half truth”, which is also the biggest lie, quite apart from the outright falsehoods circulated every day on online news sites and channels, by opening “Pasqyrë Albania” and seeing what is happening with investments.

The National Agency for Information Society expert: The second pillar is “Understand”, allowing citizens to understand what decisions their municipality is making. Here, citizens can access municipal decisions and draft decisions of municipal councils. They can search in real time for decisions approved in recent months. We have uploaded all municipal council decisions from September onwards, and citizens can consult them. We have also developed a Virtual Assistant to help citizens with the decisions that have been approved, providing a summary of what has recently been approved in their municipality.

The third pillar is the most important, where citizens have their own personal space. By logging in through e-Albania, they will be able to follow and track applications, services and complaints. There are two main sections. Under “Citizens’ Applications”, we can see every application a citizen has submitted through e-Albania, with its actual status reflected and tracked in Pasqyrë.

Prime Minister Rama: So here we come to the “Achilles’ heel” I mentioned, on which I have made my commitment clear to you: we will turn every difficulty, every request, every complaint, every problem into a DHL “parcel”.

Just as we send a parcel or letter through DHL and track its location throughout its journey, we will do the same with complaints, requests, problems and concerns. On the one hand, this will allow every citizen to see the status of their own “parcel”. On the other hand, it will allow the administration, the relevant institutions and the various levels of the hierarchy to monitor in real time where a “parcel” is stuck, where a request is stuck or where a complaint is stuck.

Because we may have discussions about whether something has been resolved, as one side or the other, the state and the citizen, understands it, but we can no longer have discussions about whether a reply was received.

Providing a timely reply is an obligation that we must treat as the foremost priority in this relationship.

The National Agency for Information Society expert: The innovation we have developed in Pasqyrë is that every service has a specific statutory deadline. The institution is required to respond within that deadline. Once the deadline has passed, Pasqyrë tracks this, and the citizen receives an SMS notification about the service whose deadline has expired, along with a link through which they can immediately submit a complaint and have it registered.

Prime Minister Rama: At the same time, this also generates an alert for the institution’s hierarchy. All these complaints have their own unique code.

 

The National Agency for Information Society expert: They all have a unique code. Just as a service comes from e-Albania with a unique code, the complaint is also registered in Pasqyrë with a unique code and is followed up by the co-governance mechanism. This is how the complaint will be tracked. It is tracked at the process level as well: where it is within the institution and at what level it is being handled. For example, whether information is being requested or it is at the approval stage. But the complaint can also be tracked at the institutional level.

 

So, if a citizen submits a complaint and more than one institution is involved in handling it, the citizen will be able to see its status at each institution, right through to the final reply they receive at the end. This entire process is managed and traceable within each institution.

 

The same applies to services, Prime Minister. Every service on e-Albania is no longer just a tracking number. All the intermediate steps are visible, showing where the service has stalled, right through to its completion.

 

Prime Minister Rama: This is the tool technology gives us to address that widespread concern people have: “the administration, the administration, the arrogance, the lack of a reply”. This tool empowers citizens by giving them control over their complaints or requests, while also putting the administration “with its back against the wall” whenever it has failed to respond on time and a citizen’s complaint or request has been lost in that ocean of bureaucracy.

 

The National Agency for Information Society expert: Another section covers priority reforms and initiatives, informing citizens about all initiatives and reforms undertaken by the government. By clicking on each initiative, citizens can find out who benefits from it, what its purpose is, which institutions are involved in delivering it, what documentation is required to take part, and then proceed to the application, which takes them directly to e-Albania to apply to participate in that initiative.

 

The next pillar is “Decide Together”, where citizens will be able to contribute to improving public initiatives.

 

We have currently linked it to the Public Consultation Register so that citizens can give their opinions on every draft act the government has under public consultation.

 

Prime Minister Rama: And here within “Pasqyrë Albania”, we also have “Flamingo Mirror”, a section dedicated to projects of particular importance and issues that attract particular public attention, so that everyone can see, with maximum transparency, the facts behind what they hear through all the channels and from all the sources of disinformation in general.

So it is a mirror against disinformation, or for keeping people properly informed.

 

The National Agency for Information Society expert: We have also dedicated a section to bringing together all the websites of ministries and the relevant institutions. Here, citizens will be able to contact the institution they are looking for directly and access all the information relating to it.

 

Prime Minister Rama: Every institution will be in this Mirror. “Pasqyrë Albania” is therefore an innovation that brings the entire state, all its windows and doors, into the digital mirror of your mobile phone or computer.

 

And a single click is enough to reach the window or knock on the door you are interested in. This mirror makes the relationship between citizens and the administration much simpler and much more direct. At the same time, as I said, it makes the administration fully visible in the face of our shared challenge, mine and yours: to have an administration that is at people’s service, responds within the statutory deadlines and operates with full transparency.

 

The National Agency for Information Society expert: We have also made it possible for Pasqyrë to be used not only on the web, but also to be installed as an application on Android and iOS. Citizens can download it directly from the website and use it as an application on both their desktop computers and their phones.

 

Prime Minister Rama: e-Albania itself is also inside the Mirror. So everything is inside the Mirror.

 

The National Agency for Information Society expert: In the coming days, we will be able to create a window for direct communication between citizens and every institution. So it will not simply be communication with a chatbot, but direct communication with the relevant institution. For example, if a pensioner requests specific information from an institution, let us say the Social Insurance Institute, they will communicate directly with the institution in real time, receive a reply, continue the exchange and receive further replies. This will also be directly with an individual, a designated person appointed by the institution to respond in real time to every request submitted by citizens. This will enable us not only to track complaints, but also, before a citizen has a complaint, to obtain information about their needs concerning a particular issue within the remit of the institution.

Prime Minister Rama: And, in the meantime, this will train the artificial intelligence agents, which will then carry out these interactions without any need for a person behind them. After a period of time, of course, because training is required and time is needed, the whole system will operate much faster, because it will be a system fully coordinated by superintelligence, in other words, by artificial intelligence, which has now begun to enter a new phase called superintelligence.

So the best is all ahead of us, and together we all help one another.

Once again, to conclude, “Pasqyrë Albania” is one of the outcomes of our reflection on the flamingo protest, on that large demonstration in early June.

The rest is another story, which I will not mix into the Mirror, because then we would get the Mirror dirty.