– Gjon Bruçi –
Mirdita, in its ancient and modern history, has many patriotic and national figures, but the Hero of the People Bardhok Biba was and will remain a great popular tribune, a fighter for freedom and an immortal partisan of communist ideals.
Due to my age, I did not get to know Bardhok Biba, and as a result, I cannot bring direct memories of this extraordinary popular tribune, one of the most prominent representatives of my great Mirdita. Therefore, I will only stop at a short episode told by characters who lived and collaborated with the hero during those fiery years of the rise of the people’s state power and the reconstruction of the country which just emerged from the war.
Look the Other Person in the Eye!
“When you talked with Bardhok Biba,” one of his fellow fighters says, “he demanded that you look him in the eye. ‘When you talk to someone and do not look them in the eye,’ Bardhok said,’ then either you are not listening to them, or you are thinking of some betrayal against them!'”
Simple, but very important. LOOK THE OTHER PERSON IN THE EYE! Both friend and foe. This was the life motto of the Hero of the People, Bardhok Biba. He looked his people in the eye and devoted himself to them selflessly. And the people trusted him and followed him in all the actions of the National Liberation War and those of the construction of the New Albania. Bardhok Biba even looked his enemy straight in the eye, without blinking. And when the moment came, he did not shy away from confronting it, but gave his young life so that Mirdita and Albania could live and flourish.
How is it explained that in just one decade of political and patriotic activity, Bardhok Biba reached the highest level of heroism and even became a legend?!
Our hero, from his days at the Shkodra Gymnasium, surely read and even recited Migjeni’s poetry, which among other things proclaimed: “We, the children of the new century / With our fiery spirit / In new battles we will clash / And for victory, we will be sacrificed.” On the other hand, he was not only a fighter for freedom but also a fighter for partisan and communist ideals, for which, as the people’s poet Dritëro Agolli sings: “They swore only once / In the First Call, in forty-one / Either we raise the New World over ruins and hell / Or nothing remains of us, not even ashes or a sound!”
Bardhok Biba and the New World
Bardhok Biba and his comrades achieved their objective. They built the new Albanian world on the ruins of the Middle Ages. In the foundations of this world, they placed their pure blood. For this, they earned the deep gratitude and respect of the people and the eternal glory of its centuries-old history.
It was our duty, as the generations that came after them, to preserve and strengthen this new world. But during the period of freedom and peace that the martyrs gifted us, unfortunately, we lost vigilance. Treachery was very close, and we failed to recognize it. Therefore, we have returned to the dark years, where values have been overturned, and anti-values have been elevated; where heroes are being smeared, and traitors are being glorified.
Today, in the dark days of bourgeois and fascist “democracy”
Today we come to the 75th anniversary of Bardhok Biba’s fall, coinciding with the jubilee year of the 80th anniversary of the Liberation of the Homeland, not to increase the glory of this hero. Bardhok Biba, with his fighting and political activity in the service of the people and the Homeland, with his sublime sacrifice, has already earned eternal glory. He does not need glory. We are the ones who need his glory. Therefore, on every anniversary and every May 5, the symbolic Day of the Martyrs, we come to Bardhok Biba and the other martyrs to gain as much as possible from their glory, as much as possible from their heroic act, which inspires and arms us and the following generations towards useful deeds for our Albania.
But in these years of the so-called “bourgeois democracy” our work has been and is incomplete. Where is the monument to our hero? Why is it not in the middle of the city, which he himself laid the foundations for in April 1949?!
Thirty-four years ago, the black hundreds of the Democratic Party, led by Sali Berisha, among whom were also the offspring of Pjetër Lleshi, Llesh Marashi and company, after overthrowing, burning and destroying everything the people had built in half a century of Enver Hoxha’s bright era, also revictimized the martyrs by toppling their monuments, busts, statues, etc.
The busts of Bardhok Biba, Ndrec Ndue Gjoka, Pal Mëlyshi and the statues of the four heroines were the emblems of Mirdita’s heroism, our pride.
If initially we were silent or tolerated this for the sake of social peace, now after three and a half decades, when things have been thoroughly clarified, and the vandals of medieval darkness have come to light, why don’t we put our pride back on the pedestal of honour where it belongs?
Let’s put our pride back on the pedestal of honour!
Twenty years ago, and precisely on the 55th anniversary of the fall of the hero Bardhok Biba, the Communist Party of Albania publicly demanded that the city of Rrëshen be named “Bardhok Biba City”! This proposal was and remains not only correct but also very significant for the region of Mirdita. This naming, as well as the reinstatement of the busts of the heroes and heroines of Mirdita, is in our hands. Let’s not wait for the state commission for the 80th anniversary of the Liberation, which so far has not even functioned on paper, but with the right of our sovereign people, let’s take the issue into our own hands and decide. At the head of this political and patriotic action should be the Veterans’ Organization and that of the Martyrs of the Homeland, which have the support of the overwhelming majority of Albanians. The 80th anniversary of the Liberation of the Homeland, which will be concluded for Mirdita on October 26 and for the whole country on November 29, 2024, should find us with the busts and statues of the heroes and heroines of Mirdita, and simultaneously with the naming of our city, “Bardhok Biba City”!
If this call is not heeded and we continue to crawl behind bourgeois political parties, deceived by the phosphorescent colours they wear when they appear before the people, our mission to defend the people’s history will fail. And a people whose history is tainted and desecrated is destined to head towards assimilation!
Glory to the Hero of the People, Bardhok Biba!
(Translated from the Albanian original and first published in “DITA” on August 6, 2024)
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