Tirana Times
TIRANA, Sep. 20 – Last week President Bamir Topi called on the judiciary not to stand by and listen when politicians attack each other, but to deal with the cases and clarify the accusations and the public at large.
Speaking at a meeting of the High Council of Justice, Topi said that politicians on both sides of the isle are trading many accusations of corruption against each other.
“The judiciary cannot stand by as a spectator,” he said.
The governing Democratic Party of Prime Minister Sali Berisha and the main opposition Socialist party of Tirana Mayor Edi Rama have exchanged daily accusations against each other, blaming many high level officials, lawmakers, or ministers of corruption and of exploiting their public positions to abuse public funds.
To add to that, the Chamber of Albanian Advocates harshly criticized the way President Bamir Topi has elected the new names for the top posts at the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court.
They said that the decisions were made based on the clannish interests and not on the personal professional and moral merits of the people. They added the right people were left out and the situation of the judiciary in the country had been deteriorating
So should Albanians believe what their president says publicly, when listening to what legal professionals say?
Albanians, who are so “dear” to the politicians and all the top officials, would really ask: “Is there a small percentage of the claimed accusations true?” because if there is any at all, then the accused people should be behind bars for the rest of their life.
Albanians also ask: are these prosecutors, judges and more law enforcement officials ready to undertake such a difficult task? Why should they run counter to those people who have put them in their posts, with or without money, or political support?
Albanians are really suspicious that anything of the kind could still happen in this country.
They would be really convinced that the ballot they cast in the elections is really worth if they see a top official or politician going behind bars.
Everybody knows that corruption is high in this country. That is told by the international community in every report or every visit any of them makes to Albania. Everyone, including politicians and top officials acknowledge that corruption is so much present and hampering the democratic progress, the country’s integration steps toward the European Union.
Moreover now Albania is also a NATO member which adds to the responsibility it has to others.
But Albanians and the world need much more than purely the nice words that go into one ear and come out of the other.
Can it be different? They listen that many top persons from both sides of the political spectrum are corrupt, taking in hundreds of millions of euros. Could that be true?
The Chamber of Advocates also called on the political parties to really consider the new names for the Constitutional and Supreme Courts very carefully.
Will they be listened to from the politicians? Hardly so, as previous experience has shown.
There should be a huge will from any political party or top official to really fight corruption in practice and not use words that become so useless when compared to the actions undertaken by their speakers.
The world is keen on real results in the fight against corruption and Albania’s progress towards the European Union will very much rely on those results. That is made clear by EU officials and their reports.
And in this fight people have the main weapon. Fighting corruption should start from people who have nothing to lose. They should hardly wait for any concrete result from their politicians, who, for the moment, know only how call each other names. This time such names are millions of euros claimed to have been abused. Such millions come from the poor and common people.
But at least the political fight urged the proper transparency authorities to publicly say they will now investigate the personal statements (on property and income) for all the top officials in the country, starting from the president.
