By Stavros Tzimas for Kathimerini
Protesters flood the streets of downtown Tirana every afternoon, chanting slogans, mainly against Prime Minister Edi Rama, but also against opposition leader Sali Berisha.
What started as a pro-environment protest is fast evolving into a widespread expression of public frustration with the country’s governance and with government corruption. More than 100,000 people are estimated to have taken part in the most recent rallies, and their numbers only seem to be swelling, as the unanticipated backlash from the residents of Zvernec against a large-scale hotel development on their beautiful Adriatic coast, in Vlore in southern Albania – by US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and a group of investors from Qatar – caused a spark that reached all the way to Tirana and is now spreading like wildfire across the rest of Albania, putting the prime minister on the spot.
Until then, Rama had touted the luxury resort project as a “jewel in the crown” of Albania’s tourism industry, in which he is heavily invested as a means of enhancing his country’s growth and securing his own political popularity. He thought that nothing and no one would stand in the way of such a project, which – apart from the financial benefits – would also earn him Trump’s much-coveted favor. However, it took one piece of news footage, in which security guards working for the investors are seen viciously beating a demonstrator protesting against the development along with other village residents and environmental protection groups, to break the dam holding back a wave of anger that is now growing – and not just for the protection of the flamingos that use the lagoon in the area that is under development.
Conspiracy theories
Rama’s initial reaction to the Zvernec residents’ protests was to dismiss them with his usual flippant manner. When he realized that a storm was brewing, however, he resorted to his pet conspiracy theories, claiming that the Greeks were agitating the protesters because they are jealous of Albania’s burgeoning tourism industry, that the Serbs and the Russians want to bring him down because he is pro-West and that the mullahs in Tehran are fighting him because he has allowed exiled mujahideen fighters to live in Tirana.
The Albanian prime minister’s next response was to fly to Zvernec by helicopter directly from a meeting on the Western Balkans in Montenegro to, purportedly, placate the protesting residents. According to local reports, they were represented at the village meeting by one person – and that person was never given a chance to speak. Rama’s assurances that the investment would go ahead and the environment would be protected did nothing to ease the public’s concerns. Instead, rallies were organized in Tirana and in other Albanian cities, such as Korce, Shkoder and Fier, as well as by Albanian immigrants in other parts of Europe. The demands became political: protesters want to see Rama and Berisha in prison, and want the “sell-off of Albania” to stop.
Accumulated frustration
As the protests gather momentum – becoming the biggest seen in Albania since 1997 when Berisha was in power – and spread across the country with no sign of abating, the question in the public sphere in Tirana, but also in foreign embassies, is whether this unexpected explosion of public frustration marks the “end of an era” for a society that is fed up – but also unpredictable – with autocratic and corrupt governments, which, among other things, are held responsible for the mass migration of the country’s young people. Last year alone, according to Albanian media, 25,000 young Albanian men and women left their country – following in the footsteps of hundreds of thousands before them – after losing hope for a better future.
So, who are the people taking part in these big, colorful rallies that are flooding the country’s public squares and streets? One thing we do know is that they are not connected to the anti-government rallies organized by Berisha – who is also in the protesters’ crosshairs – nor are they organized by any other political party.
“What makes this social uprising so remarkable is its composition,” says analyst Elez Biberaj. “It is not orchestrated by some political party; it is not guided by a single ideology. It is a coalition of university students, environmental activists, property owners, workers, pensioners and young professionals. Many had retired from political activism many years ago, convinced that it was pointless to take part. Now they’re back in the streets, united in the belief that Albania cannot carry on as it is. Their demands are clear and cohesive: They want Rama to resign; they want a government of technocrats to restore confidence; they want the abolition of laws facilitating investors without prior public consultation; they want accountability for corruption, including in high-profile cases; and they want a model of governance that relies on transparency and the rule of law.”
Student movement
Kathimerini asked one European diplomat – among those who have been following protests closely to get a feel for the public pulse and to keep their governments informed of developments – what they saw at one of the recent rallies in Tirana.
“A lot of young people – both school and university age – who are joined by the demand for Rama to leave, for the abolition of the specific law on big investments and their rejection of the existing political system. For the time being at least, they don’t have a political platform or some leader who stands out. The whole thing looks like ‘human clay’: you can’t tell how it will evolve and what shape it’ll take. It definitely seems to be gaining momentum, though,” the diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Like most mass protests of this kind, there are a lot of different voices being heard. Efforts are being made to create some kind of hierarchy, which will decide on the slogans and the speakers, on who will say what to the media and on banning political party representatives and lawmakers from taking the stage, thereby limiting the scope of manipulation and exploitation, and containing the chaos. These efforts have also included calls for a new political party formed by the protesters. Rama is watching developments closely in the hope that they will fizzle out as demonstrators tire – and head off on their summer holidays.
His optimism is stoked by the example of his friend Aleksandar Vucic, the president of Serbia, who could not be brought down by two years of massive protests – reaching a million demonstrators at times – across Belgrade and other cities, coupled with the fact that there is no credible alternative to Rama in Albania right now. He is still worried, though, and this tends to make him lash out when the discussion turns to the “flamingo revolution.”
‘Trumpian’ outburst
This is exactly what happened last week at a meeting with a group of European journalists visiting Tirana as part of a European Union program. When he was asked about the protests by a Romanian journalist, he went on the offensive, Trump-style, causing reactions from the other members of the group.
Even though analysts agree that it is too soon to predict where the situation in Albania is headed, the country’s image as an idyllic tourism destination and Rama’s image as a modern democratic leader – attributes he proudly proclaims – have been dealt a serious blow. The case of Zvernec has exposed a tourism model that relies on the ruthless, almost destructive exploitation of the country’s natural assets and beautiful coasts, with the construction of pharaonic tourist resorts that resemble entire towns.
More importantly, though, the people taking to the streets are convinced that the much-touted tourism industry is steeped in corruption – as is the Rama government more generally – making shady deals with suspect investors, serving vested interests, grabbing land from people who have the “misfortune” to live in the country’s coastal areas – among them the Greek-Albanians – and selling off public property, as is the case of the Kushner investment and the island of Sazan, which is also part of the Vlore development.
Message from Brussels
No matter what happens from here, Rama finds himself in a very precarious situation for the first time in his long tenure as Albania’s prime minister. Apart from the protesters, who are out in the streets every day demanding his resignation, officials from within his own party are starting to question his handling of the crisis, insisting that the protests have “deeper causes.” These reactions have also spilled over Albania’s border, with the European Union recently warning Rama that the government is violating European environmental regulations and that this may have an impact on the country’s accession process. What’s more, a meeting of southeastern European foreign ministers to discuss developments in Ukraine that had been planned for Tirana last week was canceled over concerns for the situation there.
Despite the explosive social and political climate, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump remain silent on the issue, even though it was their investment that triggered this public reaction. Last December, because of reactions to another one of their investments, in Belgrade, which concerned building a hotel in the place of a top military facility that had been bombed by NATO in 1999, Kushner said that he would not pursue a project that was so divisive and withdrew his interest. Will he do the same in Albania, now that his project threatens to cause a social explosion and destabilize the Rama government? Even if he does, analysts say this may not be enough to reduce the pressure on Rama.
