Skip to main content

Blackbird

Our first encounter with Albanian roads took place on the drive from the airport to the city when we arrived. The roads were bad but not as bad as I had expected, until we reached Tirana. At one junction our car lurched and bounced across what appeared to be a construction site masquerading as a road. As it turned out it was a construction site, for we had just passed Zogu i Zi.
Zogu i Zi is in the west of the city on the road from the port of Durres, which also carries traffic from the airport. The idea was that by reconstructing this junction with an overpass, the flow of traffic into and out of the city would be improved. Construction began, and as you can see from the photograph, a lot of work has already been done.
Then, a new government was elected, promising to investigate the awarding of major contracts by the previous government. An investigation was launched into the building of the overpass at Zogu i Zi and - no surprise to anyone - the new government decided that the contracts were of dubious legality. Not only that, but the government appointed experts assessing the project concluded that the overpass was entirely unnecessary and would pose a threat to pedestrians.
The contractor was ordered to stop work and the government then ordered the demolition of all construction carried out as part of the project. Cue outrage and popular protest. The mayor, Edi Rama, held a protest at the overpass last week handing out documents challenging the government's claims. The Tirana municipality has been fighting the decision through the courts, so far without success.
The Socialist opposition, together with the smaller Socialist Movement for Integration, have promised to resist the decision and protect the overpass. As well as the political dimension of the dispute, the personal animosity between Prime Minister and Democratic Party leader Sali Berisha and Tirana Mayor and Socialist Party chairman Edi Rama, has also become a factor.
Meanwhile, a major junction on one of the most important roads in the country lies in chaos and there is no indication of when something - anything - might be finished.
In the murky world of Albanian politics it is often hard to discern the rights and wrongs of these kinds of situations, but my sympathies are with the Socialist Party and the mayor. It is entirely possible that the process for awarding the contract for the construction was not exactly pure as the driven snow, but I doubt that any major conract awarded anywhere in Albania could stand up to detailed legal and financial scrutiny.
Unnecessary? No. Though given how much work Tirana's roads require, spending that much money on one project might be considered a little extravagant. At worst, though, that is argument for reducing the scale of the project, not for cancelling it entirely.
The idea that a well designed and properly constructed road system increases the risk to pedestrians in Tirana is the funniest aspect of the whole business. Even a badly designed junction would hardly make things any more dangerous for pedestrians than they already are.
Mjaft, the civil society NGO, has come up with an alternative approach, advocating the holding of a referendum in Tirana to decide the fate of the overpass. Referendums are best when used sparingly, but given that the technical issues regarding construction of the overpass are now mixed up with party politics and personal animosities it's hard to know how this issue can be resolved. Meanwhile, as Erion Veliaj of Mjaft notes, Albania's political leaders - who profess to be keen to enhance the coutry's image and attract foreign investment - look increasingly ridiculous.
We will leave Albania in 21 months and I fully expect the drive out to the airport to be as bumpy as the drive in.

Comments

ITS said…
"We will leave Albania in 21 months and I fully expect the drive out to the airport to be as bumpy as the drive in."

Is that when MI6 renews your contract?

;)

Popular posts from this blog

Dy Rame Per Tirane

I was watching Top Channel last night, first the news, then Fiks Fare. According to them Tirana's citizens now have a choice not only between Rama and Olldashi, but also between Rama and Rama. A minor right-wing faction, Parti 'Balli Kombetar' , submitted papers to the election authorities registering their candidate, Akile Rama. The people on Fiks Fare got hold of the papers and sent a reporter and camera team to the address listed for Mr A Rama. After much ringing of the bell the gate was reluctantly opened by a middle-aged woman who refused to speak to the reporter and tried to close the gate on her. Back in the studio Saimiri and Doctori - the two presenters of Fiks Fare - revealed that Mr Akile Rama was 73 years old, in hospital, and did not know he was now a candidate for mayor. They also compared two documents - the papers submitted on his behalf, and a genuine document he had signed. The signatures were not even remotely similar. There was an interview with the lea

Albania and the Perils of the 21st Century

Another article on religion in Albania appeared yesterday. Patrick Poole, writing in the American Thinker , argues that Saudi funding for the construction of mosques and the training of imams is a threat to Albania, since these mosques and imams reflect the fundamentalist interpretation of Islam dominant in Saudi Arabia.

Guide Turistike

According to the World Travel and Tourism Council , the future is bright for Albania. The Council ranks Albania ninth out of 174 countries for tourism growth over the next ten years. A summary of the Council's report is available, as is the full report complete with many pages of graphs, charts and spreadsheets. This summer I have seen a number of tourists on the streets of Tirana. Some of them may well be Albanian expats, or people of Albanian descent returning home to visit family, but others are genuine 'foreigners'. Judging from their appearance, they are probably best described as 'independent travellers' - the kind of people who are not interested in luxury hotels or crowded beaches. This is a good start, but independent travellers are not the kind of big spenders that the tourist industry likes. In the longer term, if Albania wants to bring in the kind of free-spending tourists who currently holiday in Croatia or Slovenia, there will have to be a huge invest