– Gjon Bruçi –
The city of Memaliaj is located about seven kilometres north of Tepelena, on the bank of the Vjosa River, whose waters surround three sides of the city, giving it the shape of a small peninsula. In the 1950s, Memaliaj was a small and simple village, but thanks to its underground coal reserves, it quickly transformed into a city. For half a century during the socialist period, this “workers’ city,” as it was called, contributed significantly by providing high-quality coal for the country’s industry and for export. In 1951, the mine was converted into a full-fledged enterprise, starting regular extraction of the mineral while also building the city for its residents. After 40 years of industrial activity, the mine increased coal production by 160 times compared to its first year. Additionally, the city, now fully developed, reached about 7,500 residents, equalling and even surpassing the district centre, Tepelena.
During the socialist period, Memaliaj was built, completed and beautified better than many other cities that enjoyed the status of district or county centres. Memaliaj had the same educational, health care, cultural and sports institutions as the district centre itself, but its production and entertainment activities surpassed many other districts and cities with long-standing traditions. If today’s younger generation is curious to know more about Memaliaj, they should organize a meeting with the famous comedian Agron Llakaj, who not only grew up in Memaliaj but also achieved the status of a true comedy artist with a high national reputation here. He knows the “biography” of this workers’ city better than anyone.
Unfortunately, as has happened and is happening with other cities, villages, and industrial and agricultural centres on the outskirts of the country, with the beginning of the 21st century, which coincides with the restoration of “bourgeois democracy,” the city of Memaliaj began to fall into extreme poverty. This decline forced its residents to abandon the beautiful and prosperous city and emigrate. Today, about one-third of the population remains in the abandoned city, mostly elderly people struggling with meagre pensions and social assistance. We say abandoned because for more than three decades, apart from election campaign days when votes are sought, no government officials or representatives from the centre or local levels have been seen there. The “peninsula” of Memaliaj has turned into a desolate island, where apart from the few remaining residents, no one comes to have a coffee or refresh themselves with the blue waters of the old Vjosa River. This total abandonment has marginalized the city from the attention of friends and comrades it once had in abundance.
However, while friends, comrades, and especially government officials and the state, have forgotten Memaliaj, crime has not. On July 20, 2024, a “squad” of paid or “volunteer” criminals, in the presence of patrons at a city club sipping black coffee with little sugar, unleashed a long burst of Kalashnikov bullets. The “target” was identified, but the numerous bullets exceeded the “objective” and besides the intended target, sent two others to the grave, who were enjoying a simple drink after a hard day’s work. Among the “unplanned” victims was 36 year-old waiter Gledio Mukaj, who, as his grandmother, drowned in tears, recounts, had been employed for a few days to earn his daily bread in a city where nothing is produced but only consumed in assistance and tears of sorrow for those who have left the country.
The loss of human life is painful for everyone. But when it is taken without any fault in the world, the pain transcends all boundaries. Young Gledio had worked all day serving clients and was waiting to go home late at night to rest a bit and prepare for the next day. But the bullets cut short his youth and life.
Was it a coincidence? No, it was not a coincidence. In Memaliaj, as in many cities and villages in rural areas, while the vibrant and active life of once industrious and productive people has ceased, now after being abandoned by the state, the “activity” of drugs, corruption and crime has begun. Memaliaj today has no more than 2,000 residents, whose peace and security could be ensured by a small police post if the latter cooperates with the community, and if the state is organized to the furthest corners of the country. Are there no law enforcement forces? No, they are abundant; there are 16,000 order police, not counting municipal, financial, road police, rapid intervention units, etc., plus dozens and hundreds of prosecutors, judges, investigators, including the high-level contingent of the famous SPAK, which monitors and acts against organized crime and corruption. Nevertheless, these two “assets” have covered our entire social pyramid, from the capital to distant Memaliaj. It is precisely for this reason that, even after three or four days, the police and competent authorities have not been able to identify the killers. Corruption has now entered all veins of society and the state itself, turning the latter into a “narco-state,” corrupted up to its top. As such, it, meaning the state, is entirely formal, or mostly in collaboration with crime.
Notice: Three people were killed, two of whom were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time, in the middle of the small city of Memaliaj, next to the Tirana-Gjirokastra national road, and the police have not come close to the killers’ tracks. Despite this obvious responsibility of the law enforcement agencies, it has not crossed the mind of any graduate to resign. Or at least for one of them to go and console the families of the two victims who were killed simply for being in the wrong place, while the police and law enforcement agencies were not at their “watchposts.” I believe many citizens expected that the Prime Minister himself would visit the family of the young Gledio Mukaj, and instead of the absence of a “podcast” with the young man, he would console the family for the great calamity that befell them. But this did not happen, because ordinary people, even young ones like Gledio, but who live in forgotten cities like Memaliaj, do not constitute a subject of conversation or propaganda for our Prime Minister. He is now a VIP who enters the international elite, where he tries to sell his height as expensively as possible, convinced that white sneakers with a black suit make more of an impression than a “podcast” with an ordinary young man.
I wrote this fragment with this special emphasis to show that current politicians and leaders, all the way up to the top of the social and state pyramid, not only lack the ability and dedication to build the state, order and the proclaimed democracy, but have also lost the human sensitivity towards the citizens they have undertaken to lead and protect on the difficult path of genuine democracy. Current politicians and leaders are nothing but a living reflection of the decayed capitalist system, with no possibility of transforming into true leaders of the citizens.
(Translated from the Albanian original and first published in “Gazeta SOT” on July 24, 2024)
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