I want to say from the outset that I am not writing this as a member of the Steering Committee of the Republican Party, but simply as a person and as a journalist, because I feel it is necessary and incumbent on me to put on paper what my heart tells me. It beat powerfully after the 9th Plenum of the Party’s Central Committee, and when the people, at demonstrations in Kavajë or another city, shouted, “Long live Ramiz Alia!” An entire people placed its hopes in a communist, in a leader who seemed as though he would be a democrat, who would do a great deal for Albania. What importance would his past have, when he was showing that he had been a humble collaborator, but not an accomplice or co-director with Enver in the ordeal he had planned? But (ah, that “but”) it turned out that the path you had embarked on was somehow contrary to your nature—or, more precisely, to your upbringing and worldview—and so your retreat and zigzags were plain to see. At times one got the impression: “Come on, has this man really become a democrat, or…?” I recall your speech to the communists, which was played as a recording in the district party committees. People could not understand how a leader could both support democracy and revive [the old ways], showing his teeth against it. This double “game,” this centrist tactic, produced the results we know: genuine democrats and ordinary people began to be disappointed in you, just as the left-wing extremists were, since they could not forgive you for failing to defend their idol, the former dictator Enver Hoxha. Of course, it was not easy for you—I would say it was very difficult—but leaders are leaders precisely so that they can rise above difficulties and find the right path, the one the people want. You chose this path too, while continuing to zigzag. You will ask for evidence? It is all connected, and weighs on our hearts. The first concerns the historic date of July 2, 1990. Who gave the order, and to open fire on whom, and how many were killed or disappeared that night? How can it be explained that the former Minister of Internal Affairs, Simon Stefani, who was directly responsible for the shootings, was protected by you until the moment came when you could no longer keep your hand on his shoulder? If he had ordered people to be shot without your order—which does not happen in any dictatorship—his punishment would have been immediate. To cover for that Minister Bartoleme of Tirana, you immediately opened, or left open, the entrances to the embassies; in fact, the police even allowed it during those two days, on a schedule (?)! Please tell me, could this have happened without your order? And why did the police allow it during those two days, even on a schedule (!) And why was it done? Even a child understands that this was done so that no one would find out how many were killed or disappeared on July 2. Nevertheless, you did not come onto the scene; the madness of Saddam Hussein also helped at the time, and this other crime of the Party of Labour seemed to fade from view, as if all that Enver had done were not enough. We cannot blame you for those young men who were beaten when, in accordance with the law, they sought to obtain passports to travel abroad. But we certainly cannot absolve you of the bullets that rained down at the border, after the law was passed decreeing that an attempt to escape would no longer be considered treason against the Fatherland and would be punishable by up to five years. Surely people were not shot without your knowledge, when under our system the people believe that not even a bird is shot without permission?! Once again, you remained in the shadows, thinking that you were not implicated in that terror intended to purge the “enemy” youth of socialism. But the public has the ability and instinct to read what is hidden in the shadows. As long as you do not give figures and do not announce who was killed at the border (even though you report every thief who is caught), it means that you yourself are precisely the one who has no interest in this truth. How could one not be horrified by this man, seeing what happened, as everyone knows? Why wasn’t there shooting a day earlier? Why wait until the next day, and who gave the order for the massacre? Why was the Minister of Internal Affairs protected, if he had not received the order from Prime Minister Fatos Nano or from you? Why did you make the former head of the General Investigation Office promise not to arrest those whom the specialists considered responsible, but only one policeman? In whose name did you intervene to prevent the guilty from being found, and why? Was it perhaps because the person who gave the order would be revealed, and he would be very close to you—if not you yourself—since at one point you had ordered people to be shot in Tirana? So this shows that the order was expected from you alone. When the event was so serious, why did you not appear on television or go in person to democratic-minded Shkodër, but instead remained silent for so long? As always, silence, and passing the baton so that emotions would fade with the passage of time. But what are we to let fade first? These killings, the tragic exodus that emptied Albania of the flower of its youth, or the ruined economy? The new Albania cannot accept that “the model is to blame.” The people understand that this was the system, but that dictator Enver Hoxha degraded it even further. We cannot blame you for those years, because had you objected, you would have paid with your life. But you have been in charge for six years, and not only did you fail to improve the economy, you made it even worse, bringing it to catastrophe. A deus ex machina was found: apparently all the other members of the Political Bureau were to blame; strangely, they were “watching the threshing floor,” while you…

By July 15, there will be pluralist leadership in the executive committees throughout Albania. Cooperation with the other political parties began urgently, on the basis of consensus, in order to offer PR members, its supporters, or other specialists selected from among the most capable and honest people positions of leadership (chairperson, secretary and section heads). The names of our candidates must be approved by the steering councils of every branch. STEERING COMMITTEE OF THE ALBANIAN REPUBLICAN PARTY

Whenever bureaucracy is discussed, I don’t know why I remember the Russian tale “The Old Man and the Turnip,” whose roots had spread so deep that, to pull it out, the old man had to call on the household animals for help as well. But to pull out the roots of bureaucracy, people, you must join hands and pull that root very, very, very hard, so that not a single strand remains, because they are cancerous metastases that grow and spread again. For the monist state to survive, it needed an entire bureaucratic apparatus, with 110-l [unclear] privileged apparatchiks in various fields, even without an education, but useful for carrying out orders from above. This apparatus was filled especially with ideologues manufactured by the Party school, who became the country’s directors and highest leaders, directing for decades the fields of politics, the economy, art, culture, science and “in the honor” [unclear]. This apparatus extended along two lines: the party and the state. The Party directed; the state was buried, leaving a free hand for theft, abuse and misappropriation, which grew stronger, passing through the path of crimes as inhuman as any humanity has ever seen, as an alleged necessity for such a small people, who are now experiencing one of the greatest crises. FATIME GERBI (Continued on page 4)

WHAT IS TRANSFER? What is the present identity of state property that is to pass into private ownership? Here, it seems, we hit a snag: we will find its identity deep in how it was created and developed up to the present day of “transfer.” The decisions made so far that set the task of transferring it discuss how units will be organized after the transfer, not how the transfer will take place. The latest law says that the method for establishing this transition and privatization is in force; it differs from transferring state property into private ownership or forming new entities. The question arises: What is the economic and legal identity of the social owner before it passes into other hands? Who owns it, and how was it formed by its owners in Albania? According to one published figure, the value of the country’s operating social assets is 60 billion lekë. These assets are put to work by 1.388 million employees, of whom 705 thousand work in agriculture. According to another set of data, in 1989, as reported in the yearbook, these assets amounted to 17.434 billion lekë of industrial production and 8.772 billion lekë of agricultural production, against an economic turnover of income plus expenditure of 14.469 billion lekë. These figures are important to keep in mind in order to understand the continuation of the reasoning behind the decision on privatization. What share of the assets produced does each worker receive, as a collective owner—that is, an owner of the country’s social capital? It amounts to 43.227 thousand lekë per employee, an average for the country as a whole. If we go further, by branches and sectors of the economy, such an average will vary. But the identification we sought to make was this: the economy has been activated by 1.388 million employees who support 675,456 families, a population of 3,199,200 inhabitants. With the shift from a state economy to a market economy, [unclear], will a large part become the income of worker-owners? From what will wages then come? Before we address this clarification, we should consider the alternative before us: How can you go from rich to poor? How can you go from poor to rich? In heavy industries, for example, [unclear] billion lekë of agricultural production, which would be put to work, it is understood that wages derive from work on assets that generate profit. In industry, these assets amounted to 23.376 billion lekë in 1989. The consumption component of the annual cost of the product was 7.190 billion lekë. Wages were 952 million lekë for 24,271 employees. Gross sales production amounted to 9.593 billion lekë. THE STATE—A FAIR DISTRIBUTOR First case: What would happen if the state, as regulator, distributed state assets fairly, raising hopes by resolving once and for all the economic links between property, wages and prices? We could take a simple example: agree to raise the material component of the cost price by 20 percent; double wages; and set the selling price of products 50 percent above a given level, let us say the 1989 level: Wages would rise from 952 million to 1.904 billion The material component of cost from 7.408 billion to 8.890 billion Profit from 1.233 billion to 3.592 billion Sales from 9.593 billion to 14.386 billion So, if we had inherited from previous years a basic social fund of more than 23.376 billion lekë of agricultural production? ... With these income figures from work, more than one continuation of the reasoning behind the decision on privatization. ... freedom, which would be put to work by 24,271 employees, would yield a product for sale not worth 9.593 billion lekë, as it did, but 14.386 billion; when wages doubled, material and energy costs rose 20 percent, and the selling price rose 50 percent, profit increases by more than 2.9 times. Alarm?! Yes! We would have it in those directions that matter greatly today and even more in the future for reviving and strengthening the hope that: Labor would distribute itself, and do so fairly. It would go where there is little or almost no demand for materials: roads, trade, tourism, agriculture, services. This would be driven by the increase in the purchase price of materials (which burden industrial costs), the rise in the cash wage in the distribution of labor, and the clearing out of surplus positions. PROFIT would increase so much that it would open the way to raising the rate at which the fixed capital stock is renewed, for example to 1.5 times the depreciation period at the level of the comparative year. Second case: Are we rich? Could we one day find ourselves completely poor? Let us follow in the footsteps of ... OSman AlushKa (Continued on page 2)

How could one not be horrified by this man... (Continued on page 4)

All right, then—it was a mistake. But now, when it is indisputable that the law has been violated...

— PETITION OF THE ALBANIAN REPUBLICAN PARTY — THE ALBANIAN REPUBLICAN PARTY CALLS ON THE ENTIRE ALBANIAN PEOPLE TO UNANIMOUSLY SUPPORT THE REPUBLIC OF KOSOVO, PROCLAIMED BY THE ASSEMBLY OF KAÇANIK ON JULY 7, 1990. THE REPUBLICAN PARTY FIRMLY DEMANDS: 1. THAT THE GOVERNMENT OF ALBANIA RECOGNIZE THE REPUBLIC OF KOSOVO, PROCLAIMED BY THE LEGITIMATE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE PEOPLE OF KOSOVO, AND CALLS ON ALL THE GOVERNMENTS OF THE WORLD TO RECOGNIZE THIS REPUBLIC WITH EQUAL RIGHTS, LIKE ALL THE OTHER REPUBLICS OF THE SFRY. 2. THAT ALL ALBANIANS LIVING IN THEIR OWN LANDS IN MACEDONIA, MONTENEGRO AND SOUTH-EASTERN SERBIA BE GRANTED THE RIGHT TO SELF-DETERMINATION. 3. THAT THE SERBIAN AND YUGOSLAV OCCUPYING FORCES WITHDRAW IMMEDIATELY FROM THE REPUBLIC OF KOSOVO, SO THAT PEACE AND CALM MAY BE ESTABLISHED. 4. THAT THE ARMING OF SERB-MONTENEGRINS RESIDING IN KOSOVO AND OF CHEtnik formations be halted, and that the weapons distributed be urgently collected. 5. THAT ALL ALBANIAN POLITICAL PRISONERS BE RELEASED IMMEDIATELY AND THE SAVAGE CAMPAIGN OF SYSTEMATIC REPRISALS AGAINST ALBANIANS BE STOPPED. 6. KOSOVO IS A REPUBLIC. NO ONE HAS THE RIGHT TO DENY THIS HISTORICAL REALITY.

— THE PARTY OF LABOUR ILLEGALLY SEIZED THE BUILDINGS OF RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES — In 1967, when Enver Hoxha began his fantastic war against religion, like Don Quixote against the windmills, the corresponding decree was also issued, dated April 11, 1967, and numbered 4263. It is written there in black letters on white paper: [THE PROPERTY OF R...] Fine, then, a mistake was made; but now, when it is indisputable that the law has been mutilated, what is the state waiting for before returning these properties to the religious communities, since they were never nationalized? According to this decree, still in force—IMMOVABLE PROPERTY OF THE RELIGIOUS COMMUNITIES, EXCEPT FOR THE BUILDINGS IN WHICH THEY ARE HOUSED, PASSES INTO STATE OWNERSHIP.” The decree thus clearly stipulates: “Except for the buildings in which they are housed.” Nevertheless, the triumphant communists, victorious over the turbans of the hodjas and the brothers and cassocks of the Catholic and Orthodox priests, did not even heed the law they themselves had enacted; like a party and a state that appropriates and seizes whatever it wants, they took those buildings too. All right, then—it was a mistake. been violated, to the religious communities, given that they were never nationalized? Under this decree, which is still in force, the state must also pay these communities the rents, together with the cost of any damage done to those buildings. This is only fair and is their due, because the Party of Labour and the corresponding one-party state treated them worse than in the Middle Ages. It is true that back then they burned such atheist assets at the stake, but only those who declared their achievements. The others, along with the laboratories of research facilities, were left alone, and science moved forward. So things were done even worse than in the Middle Ages.