O tempora, o mores. After Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Infrastructure and Energy Belinda Balluku faced criminal charges, and after the court suspended her from office and banned her from leaving the country, what one would normally expect is either her immediate resignation or her immediate dismissal by Prime Minister Edi Rama. Neither happened. What happened instead was unimaginable and absurd: as if some great national calamity had struck, the Prime Minister declared that Albania now “remains without a deputy prime minister.”
In any normal country democratic or otherwise when such a high-ranking official, whether a deputy prime minister or a minister, is indicted on serious corruption charges, the response is straightforward: resignation or immediate dismissal. In Albania, however, the political reflex seems to bypass the substance of the accusations and instead fixate on theatrics. When the Special Court Against Corruption and Organized Crime suspended Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Infrastructure and Energy Belinda Balluku just three days after prosecutors filed criminal charges Prime Minister Edi Rama’s first reaction was astonishing: “Now Albania remains without a deputy prime minister,” he lamented.It was a statement so strangely tone-deaf and self-defeating that it instantly drew disbelief among observers.
The logic is as troubling as the optics. A country does not suffer because a deputy prime minister under criminal investigation is removed; it suffers when such officials remain in office. One local analyst captured the absurdity with biting irony: “This is not a problem at all. They can always find another thief to appoint. Where is the difficulty here?” It was sarcasm, yes, but it carried the weight of truth. Balluku is not the exception—she is part of a pattern.
Before her, another deputy prime minister, Arben Ahmetaj, fled the country after being charged with corruption and money laundering and is now internationally wanted. Albania’s former environment minister is in prison for corruption. The former health minister is also behind bars. His deputy minister has been prosecuted as well. A former interior minister was indicted and convicted. The mayor of Tirana sits in custody over multiple corruption and money-laundering charges. Dozens of other officials and MPs are under investigation or already serving sentences.
Against this backdrop, the prime minister’s public distress that the country has a temporary vacancy is not only absurd it is an indictment of his own political culture. And yet the spectacle did not end there. Balluku herself, suspended by court order, responded with equal incredulity: “If Prime Minister Edi Rama were abroad, who would convene the government?” As if her personal indispensability were a legal argument. As if institutional continuity depended on the fate of a minister under indictment.
O tempora, o mores.!
How is it possible that in a NATO member state one that insists it will soon join the European Union a deputy prime minister facing serious criminal charges does not resign immediately? How is it possible that she defends herself not with facts, evidence, or legal arguments, but with political theatrics about “who will convene the government”? How is it possible that the prime minister does not dismiss her at once?
These are not merely questions of political etiquette; they expose a deeper structural failure a political culture drifting toward the authoritarian and the corrupt. A culture in which accountability is negotiable, responsibility is optional, and public office is treated as personal entitlement.
The most troubling signal is not the alleged corruption itself though the sums involved are staggering but the reaction of those in power. Instead of recognizing the gravity of the situation, the prime minister’s instinct is to protect the official under investigation and frame her suspension as a national administrative crisis. Instead of stepping aside, the suspended deputy prime minister insinuates that her presence is essential for the functioning of the state.
This is not European political culture. It is something else entirely.
And it raises a final, unavoidable question: How can Albania claim it is ready for EU membership when senior officials under criminal investigation cling to office and when the head of government treats their removal not as a necessity for integrity, but as a national inconvenience?
The crisis is not that Albania “has no deputy prime minister.”
The crisis is that it has a leadership unable or unwilling to understand what accountability means.
The post Albania’s Political Absurdity:Doomsday – The Day Albania “Lost” Its Deputy PM appeared first on Tirana Times.
