By Preç Zogaj
There was very good news this week: the return to work, after a two-month hiatus, of American experts assisting SPAK and the Special Anti-Corruption Court (GJKKO).
Albanians who do not want the return of impunity in high spheres have reasons to feel at ease. The prosecutors of SPAK and the judges of GJKKO have even more reasons to feel encouraged.
We must remember that when the new administration of President Trump took office in January of this year, it suspended all foreign assistance and aid programs for a three-month period in order to verify their efficiency and relevance to its priorities. Secretary of State Marco Rubio had announced that programs passing the test would be automatically reactivated. Others would be closed or restructured. Logical, all of it.
SPAK and the new justice system in our country passed the test in less than three months. Washington had understood several weeks ago that there were no doubts about their mission and work. Now, it is entirely clear that their support will continue as before. In fact, it will be even stronger.
This new development once again proves that American patronage in support of the new justice system has been bipartisan. That is, supported by both Democrats and Republicans. But it is more significant this time. One can understand why.
The enemies of the new justice system, increasing in direct proportion to the number of those investigated and convicted, have been rubbing their hands together these past two months, celebrating, inciting, and predicting the stalling of the American plug, the abandonment of SPAK by the US. The Cassandra-like figures who spread dreams and wishes in the air must record yet another failure of their bets.
In fact, “Trumpism” has set unprecedented records of misunderstanding in Tirana in recent months. As if the political agenda with which Trump won the elections to lead the world superpower were tailor-made for the horizon, frustrations, and personal issues of high-ranking officials and former officials of our political village under investigation, being investigated, in trial, or sentenced, sanctioned, or candidates to be sanctioned. The format of these misunderstandings at high levels multiplies in creative forms among the brainless followers below. It’s a tragicomic book in itself.
Nothing new, nothing to be surprised by. The decline of the US has always been and remains their horizon.
But the hour of meeting with the truth is coming.
The final truth is that the Americans have returned. The next day, as a direct response to the return of American experts, the chairman of the Democratic Party, Sali Berisha, once again blamed Soros for the justice reform. Hoping to stir Trump against a “devilish” act by his enemy, or to provide a “principled” justification for the (impossible) promise to dissolve SPAK, or to gather some votes from among the socialist ranks, who cannot find their way in SPAK, or who knows what idea lingers in his mind, pushing a minority option in the Albanian electorate.
History repeats itself. Back in 2017, when Trump was ‘marrying’ the presidency for the first time, the Democratic Party did the same. They sued the reform, which they had themselves voted for, as a creation of Soros. We know what the stance of the first Trump administration was on the “Soros enemy” reform. Ambassador Donald Lu strongly pushed for the establishment of new justice institutions, despite many obstacles created by the opposition. The following Ambassador, Yuri Kim, appointed by Donald Trump, strongly supported their establishment.
Trump’s people have twice verified the co-authorship of the US, European, and Albanian actors in the justice reform. It emerged as a ‘sui generis’ reform, with some provisions on the limits of Western legality, but there was no other way to fight impunity in the system and an elite above the law in Albania. Repeating the same intrigue under these conditions is a way to diminish and insult the USA, the President. I’m not even mentioning the former Chancellor Merkel and a host of prime ministers and high-ranking European officials yesterday and today, who have supported and continue to strongly support the new justice system. I won’t even add the fact that SPAK’s balance sheet is the strongest push for our country to become an EU member. The reform may be revisited for some provisions overtaken by its own success, but its pillars cannot be touched.
Anyone is within their rights to defend themselves against accusations. But to see the big world through the lens of personal trouble is to diminish it or see it like an ostrich.
