Prime Minister Edi Rama in the Civil Society Forum for the Western Balkans under the Vienna Summit:

It seems that Aleksandar made the fast part, and I am going to make the furious part starting from the very first remark I have to make. We are very happy to meet with the Civil Society, but we have not waited to come to Vienna to do it. We have been doing it all the time, on a daily basis, for many years, and I would happily see us and the Civil Society together to not tell each other in Vienna what one is doing better or worse, but what we together should tell you, the Commissioner, the EU, what they can do better for us. This would be good, because I very much want the Commission to listen to what the Civil Society has to say not only about how bad things are here and there, but how bad they feel about the EU. It is also something that has to be heard.

Secondly, I would say, you heard it, Serbia is a country that is struggling a lot to get out of a long process of stagnation, and problems and so on, and still it is about -1, -0.5, and 0.5 and then 1. And I am not going to tell you that Albania is a bit better, 2 point something, then something point 2, because the whole compared to what the people need is nothing point something. So, we are now in a moment that we have really to understand one thing: either we are in it altogether, or we can’t make it.

Look what’s happening with asylum seekers. They’re going from Serbia, they’re going from Macedonia and they’re going from all the Balkans. Why? Because, young people have no time to wait for another decade, and for another two decades, and we are not magicians. We cannot make for them right know what they aspire and what they see, and what the German model offers, and the EU offers at least through television.

We need to work together, and this Berlin Process has been fantastic because we have been together for only a year, and now look. We have spent long, long years for a short way and now, in a very short time, we made a long way. We are meeting today with Aleksandar, and this is not anymore historical. It’s just routine. Nobody is going to tell tomorrow “They met”, how he saw me, how I saw him, what our eyelashes told”. They will say: What did they bring from this meeting? Is anything additional in their pockets for us, or is it just good intensions? And this is the point. We need to give substance to this Berlin Process, because our economies are moving. Now, I’m not going to bore our dear President of Parliament and our dear President of the Erste Foundation, and all the Civil Society, honorable guests here, with how much progress we did, because this would be too boring for them, if not unnerving. So, I’m not going to say what progress we did. I’m going to say simply that the Balkans need a strategic approach from Europe. And if politically we have a strategic approach that started to be visible one year ago, now we need it financially.

So, I will conclude with a simple point. We have started, we have embarked on a reform of our educational system. We went from an educational system that was all based on the principle “go to university and become a lawyer”. We succeeded to have the largest number of lawyers for meter square in Europe. From a system based on dozens and dozens of universities that were private and were simply making you a lawyer by paying, but not necessarily by going to school, to a system that is dual. We want to implement in Albania the German dual system of vocational training, to give vocational training a lot of emphasis.

For two reasons. First, because this will qualify our workforce, will create real jobs, will make foreign investors feel much more comfortable coming to our country, and secondly because this people and go and work regularly in Germany or in other places in Europe where there is these types of works that are very much needed.

A year ago we tried to talk about it, before the Berlin meeting, and it seemed to be not very appealing. Today, this should be the point.

All these Länders in Germany that are suffering so much from this wave. Of course, we are not part of the biggest part of the wave. We are part of the smallest part of the wave, meaning the Balkans, because the biggest part is coming from other countries. But at least for the Balkans, they can simply adopt and tutor our vocational training schools, and it’s not costly. Of course, it needs some money, but it is far less costly than all these consequences, to finance a dual system in Albania and in the region, not simply for money but also to bring a “know-how”, and to make it as fast as possible by doing two things.

First, tell the young people: “Look, you don’t to go there and then be brought back. You need just to have your profession, and then you can just try. You can try it here, or you can try it there.” Simple. But the most important thing is that this will give people perspective.

One datum, and I stop it. Before the accession, in Bulgaria there were only 14% of people saying “we want to stay in Bulgaria”. All the rest wanted to leave. And you know how much they left from Bulgaria, from Romania, not to mention the other countries. Now, is it an answer to stay in this intermediate space? We are now candidates. But candidates, you know, it’s like “I want to get married but I have not yet someone wanting to marry me.” So, we need to go further, and we need to open negotiations, because it’s about telling people: “Our place is in Europe, Europe has rules, and we should play by the rules. But in the same time, playing by the rules is not going to keep us only under frustration and under isolation.” Playing by the rules will make us be part of the larger pitch. I mentioned the pitch before the football game, because I’m not going to play.

I want to say very simply that I have had the chance to be on both sides. I have been in Civil Society, hating to be in a diameter of 100 meters with any politician, and then I have gotten worse because I started to do politics.

I have a question. Don’t you think that we are comparing the incomparable, in the sense that don’t you think there is a structural change in the society that obliges to change a bit the view of civil society like a network of NGOs? Because today we are living in a space where practically society is much more vocal thanks to the social networks. Social networks have made practically possible for much more people than the professionals of workshops, seminars and conferences to say what they think. And don’t think that we are insensitive towards it.

We are much more sensitive, I think, today than the previous generations of politicians, not because we are better, in the sense that we are better people, but because we are obliged to be much more attentive. It’s about a much faster building-up of the public opinion through tools that are completely different. So, I would be careful in saying, in defining Civil Society today like the Civil Society we have in mind of the 90s, or of the first 10 years of 2000. Some NGOs that are gathering around and are doing things. Fine. I’m not saying that they are out fashioned, but I am saying that it’s a much broader notion.

Secondly, Civil Society has always had the conviction that it can fix the government. I don’t think that the government should fix Civil Society. What we can do, what we should do and what we do is to create the best conditions of freedom and possibility of interconnection. And then, what we have done for example in Albania in every decision-making process, for every bill, people from Civil Society, not simply NGOs but also people from interest groups, are heard.  The amount of hearings that is being done today in the Albanian Parliament is going very high, sometimes eve too high.

Answering to this question, I think that we are fine with it. I want to let you know that we are working with the Serbian government. It’s not that we are waiting for the expertise to come from elsewhere. We are working, we are thinking about how to go through. I praise Commissioner Hahn for being very helpful with that, because he has been very helpful for us with his experience in regional cooperation. His knowledge has been our bless in that case. But I want to say simply that this process has done a miracle politically speaking. And it’s because of Europe, if we are today here, and we are in a scenery like this. One year ago this was quite impossible to be imagined. Now, it’s normal. This is the appealing side of the European project, and this is what has made us be all good to each other. We didn’t become angels. It’s like my dear friend, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bosnia said, we are happy to say we don’t have any more open issues, now let’s talk economy. But, nobody should think that we are unable to have open issues again.

We need to strengthen economy. People want results. And, let’s face it. With the budgets we have, with the ceilings in the budgets we have, with the fiscal adjustments we need to have after so many long years of financial anarchy, and with the constraints we have, it’s impossible to meet people half way in their aspirations. So, it’s not about looking at Brussels like a money resource. It’s about combining. Imagine if Germany hadn’t unify right away. Imagine if Germany had been told “now you need to deal with benchmarks, and then let’s see how you have improved”, and so on. It wouldn’t have been the Germany we have today. Of course, I’m not saying that we should avoid benchmarks, that we should avoid priorities, that we should avoid all this integration process as such, because this is helpful for us. It’s the only tool of modernization we have.

But in the same time, you know, by not saying we want to become EU tomorrow, we want to be “E”. The “U” will come with the years, but at least be “E”. People living in the Balkans should feel that they are “E”, and they will be “U”, and EU, but they need to see it. And what are we talking about”?

We have been talking since the beginning with Aleksandar on the Nish-Pristina-Durres road. We are talking with Montenegro and Croatia about this Blue Highway, and several other projects. In terms of money it’s nothing point something compared to the huge financial potential, but in terms of what it will bring to the region it’s not just infrastructure. It’s hope and it’s economy.

Commissioner Hahn said something very, very important. It’s not a place that is somewhere out of Europe. It is in the middle of Europe. What does it mean connecting South Croatia, Montenegro and Albania through the Blue Highway? It means connecting EU itself, because Slovenia, Croatia and Greece are disconnected due to this missing road. What does it mean connecting Nish, Pristina and Durres? It means that the port of Durres becomes the port of everyone. And we want to see very much these things. In the same time, we will do our job, and I think we have to go also faster in the direction of building our own behavior like being part of Europe, by having an economic union, by erasing all tariffs and all barriers and all type of bureaucracy that we will have practically to erase when we are part of Europe. We can do it now. Nobody impedes us for this. We will go like that, but at the end we should not forget that people will want to touch to believe.

We are not the region of Jesus Christ. We are the region of Saint Thomas. If we don’t’ touch, we don’t believe.

Thank you very much!

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The two-day EU – Western Balkans Summit started today in Vienna. The Vienna meeting of the leaders of the Western Balkan countries is part of the Berlin Process, which began a year ago, in order to strengthen dialogue and interaction based on concrete projects between the countries of the region and the region itself with the European Union.

On the first day, Prime Minister Rama was invited to the high-level panel of the Civil Society Forum for the Western Balkans organized by the Erste Foundation and Friedrich Herbert. The prime ministers of Albania, Serbia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Austria, Commissioner for Enlargement at the European Commission and representatives of civil society of the Western Balkans countries joined the Forum and discussed on the role and importance of civil society in social life and political decision making.