TIRANA TIMES EDITORIAL
Albania’s new government is in the process of implementing a series of changes in how the country is run. Most of what it has done so far, addressing issues of rule of law and human rights, is welcomed by most Albanians. However such actions – so far largely symbolic – need to be sustained and go further and deeper if the government is going to be successful in implementing its promise of systemic change.
Many of the government’s first actions are clearly designed as part of a public relations campaign to shape an image of a government that is close to people’s problems and cares about how the country is perceived. Beyond the shock and awe of demolishing high-rise illegal constructions, the lighter touches are there too. Whether it is a minister picking up a Roma child and driving him to the hospital or the interior minister making sure members of parliament get parking tickets when they break the rules – these are good symbolic gestures – but only if they are used as a way to build and implement a stronger system.
While promoting a good image is not a bad thing per se, unless this action is sustained, the new government risks falling into the same problems of its predecessors – which built a gilded veneer in the first mandate while many things rotted inside. In the second mandate, much of their accomplishments unraveled in the eyes of the voters. There are lessons to be drawn by the new government there and elsewhere in the world.
Any democratically-elected government has a grace period at the start of its mandate in which the public opinion will support its work almost unconditionally. New governments will largely use this period to tackle the obvious problems – the low hanging fruit – to fulfill electoral promises in order to build up support for the more difficult parts governing plans down the road.
So far, the best thing the new government has done in the view of this newspaper is to deal a blow to the gambling establishments, which had spread like a cancer in Albanian cities and towns, creating a bad image for society and promoting desperation, poverty and criminality. To achieve its aims, the government started with strictly implementing the laws on the books and promised to change them in the future, when it hopes to ban gambling altogether.
It now needs to take that template and apply it to building and enforcing a system that allows no room for corruption and organized crime to thrive.
These topics are not just the buzzwords that keep appearing in European Union reports about Albania. They are real problems that Albanian society must first fix for its own good. The hope for EU membership serves as a catalyst, but at the end of the day systemic change will help Albania itself, leading a modernization of society, a stronger economy and better.
The current government has a strong mandate and the hopes of an entire nation on its shoulders. It is a responsibility it should not take lightly. It should not stop at the cosmetic changes we have seen so far. Rule of law is not about simply tearing down high-rise buildings because they have been illegally constructed. It is about building a system where no one dares to start constructing illegally in the face of the law and societal pressure.
