The Commission: “We are having difficulties” It is acknowledged that there are organizational hurdles a few days before the vote □ Some local centers refuse to be reorganized according to the latest directive. Meksi steps in: “Authorities in the districts must enforce the law” □ Delays in drawing up the lists. Population movements toward the lowlands are creating confusion. In the South, the problem of migrants in Greece FATOS BAXHAKU TIRANA — The Central Voting Commission is in difficulty. At least, several people close to the commission say that they still do not have the real picture of how the referendum vote is being organized. Since the government has set the voting date for 6 November, most of the work should already have been completed. But, apparently, there are still problems. First, with the voter lists. According to data from local authorities, in many districts population movements from mountainous areas toward the lowlands and especially toward the plains have been observed, which has created confusion in compiling the lists. The commission has asked that the latest directive be respected, according to which polling stations must be reorganized when such population movements occur. But not all local centers have accepted this. For this reason there have also been interventions from the central level. Second, in the South the problem is even more complicated, since in many areas a considerable part of the voters are in Greece. This makes it difficult to determine the real number of referendum participants. Sources close to the commission also say that there are delays in distributing the materials and in the final designation of the centers. On the other hand, Prime Minister Meksi has asked that local authorities in the districts enforce the law and the commission's directives. A ballot box

After the tragedy in Italy Elbasan, the victim’s parents speak about the Otranto tragedy ELBASAN — “Perhaps it is not our son. It may have been a radio error.” The hope brought by the news spread on Wednesday and Thursday by Albanian and Italian media about the tragic accident in the Strait of Otranto may not have been accurate, at first accompanied the anguish of the parents and friends of the 26-year-old young man from Elbasan, Arian Kotherja. That hope soon began to fade. On Thursday his relatives went to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tirana to ask about the procedure for bringing the body back to Albania. In the early nineties Arian had been in the salons of the p... together with him, carrying 16 other undocumented migrants toward the Italian coast, when the first explosion occurred. An explosion that extinguished the dream of a young man and dressed his family in mourning. When did you hear the news? “Quite by chance. We were listening as usual to the morning news program on the radio. At first we did not believe our ears. It was a very big shock. Then we listened again at 3:30 p.m. It was the same news. Immediately we got in touch with the radio journalist, who explained to us that he had learned of the event from the Italian media. When we finally spoke with Italy, they were telling us the exact news. That gave us hope that perhaps it was a mistake. And later? “Later we called the boy’s friends in Italy, but even there no one gave us a definite answer. They knew as much as we did. Television had arrived later, but it was the only source for us. For his misfortune and that of the others. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, relying on the first news, began the procedures for returning the body.” When did he leave home? “Arian left on Sunday together with a friend. But as they told us, the motorboat had set off on Tuesday. And while they were trying to warn us that he had arrived safely, we learned of his death.” Mentor Kikia The migrants’ motorboat

Beauty emigration loneliness CARLO BOLLINO TIRANA — The most beautiful Albanian girls parade before the jury. Today and tomorrow the Miss Albania competitions will provide a few pleasant moments. Despite the competition’s simple appearance, beauty — behind the smiling, elegantly dressed contestants on stage — conceals an unknown, invisible part of Albanian reality. By taking part in the central jury, I got to know Albania for the first time. All the girls, of course beautiful, though not all equally beautiful; each one, many of them with a great sense of loneliness. Looking at their lives, recounting their problems, one cannot but notice it. Some of the girls cry as they confess that they feel a great loneliness. And far from home they carry it with them. There is no doubt that beauty is a gift that helps a young life, but it never makes one happy. Albania has truly Albanian women. But where were they born? And this time the question for Miss is answered: from the side of life or from life when there is also a tragedy. Girls abroad. What is life? It is a condition of loneliness. In every day of emigration: suffering, discrimination, danger, humiliation endured by Albanians in exile. But we rarely think about the greatest misfortune. The mass emigration of recent years — economically helpful and painfully so — risks producing, as a side effect, precisely loneliness. And what can those who emigrate do (and these are young women too) if there is always someone who loses a friend, a companion, a love. On Sunday, in front of the television this evening, admire the girls who parade or even criticize them, but let us think for a moment that behind the smiling lips there is another sadness. It is good to know that when young people are worn down by loneliness, sooner or later it is society that pays the price.

“Berisha and in Skrapar he was also able to take part broadly in the reports of officials—the minister of several prefectures of the opposition. On the same day he arrived in Gramsh. The same source reported that at the rallies held on Thursday in Gjirokastër, in the city center, in Korçë, Pogradec, Skrapar [?], P.T., Shën, there was a closing event organized in Peqin, while Chairman Eduard Selami was in Mat and later Kavajë and Durrës. The chairman of the PS, Servet Pëllumbi, accompanied by Luan Hajdaraga and other party deputies, was in Berat, and Kuçovë on the way to Krujë. Here there were moments of tension between supporters of the PS and the PD. The rally took place accompanied by the “battle of slogans” from both sides.

PS activist arrested: “It was a fake stamp” LIBRAZHD — The first arrest related to the referendum has occurred. A notice from the Ministry of the Interior reports the incident that took place on Thursday. According to this source, the head of the local organization in Librazhd, Fatos Zharri, was detained with a forged stamp of the Lunë village voting commission. Along with him, the driver of the vehicle in which he was traveling to Lunë, Agron Gjeta, was also detained. Among those arrested, the notice also mentions the teacher himself in connection with the detention of the PS activist.

More cases in hospitals LEZHË — Cholera continued to strike in Lezhë. On Wednesday and Thursday, on the third floor of the city’s infectious diseases hospital — prepared to receive those affected by the epidemic — four new people were admitted. All of them are from the villages of Zejmen and Torovicë, with symptoms caused by water contaminated with chlorine. These four people all had immediate breathing difficulties. Those affected by the amebiasis epidemic died near the deaths and the lives of two of them — who had just left the hospital mercy wards. About 100 kilometers from Lezhë, cholera attacked again in Kavajë. Here its “victims” were the Tila couple from the village of Pili, who a few days earlier had spent a guest night in Shëngjin. They developed intestinal symptoms affected by the epidemic. While husband Tila had taken along an assistant to protect against a vibrio, to protect one of them in the end, both ended up in hospital. At least they were immediately taken to the capital’s infectious diseases hospital. Ir. Ra. Qe. Ca.

Two cars down a slope ELBASAN — A day of terror for the 30 passengers who on Thursday were traveling toward the village of Gjylë in Elbasan on the back of a truck. On a dangerous bend, in order to avoid colliding with another car coming toward them, the “Skoda” left the road and rolled down a slope. A rollover that took all the passengers with it, causing the death of one of them — an 18-year-old from the village of Pashtresh — and 18 injured, who were immediately taken to hospital by the state ambulance service and a taxi driver. Work is still under way to extract the crushed bodies from the accident, with hemorrhage and severe fractures. Without deaths but with the risk of permanent paralysis for P. Mishkan, 27, another accident that also occurred on Thursday on the Tepelenë-Gjirokastër road ended. The driver of the Audi 1 swerved off the road and ended up in hospital with a spinal fracture, while his companions suffered only minor injuries. Me. Kl. / Ra. Ko.

YESTERDAY IN ALBANIA The National Council, at the end of the second republican congress, has elected the new Steering Committee. The newly elected committee has also confirmed the political movement for the most pressing problems adopted by the congress. Chairman Sabri Godo was absent from the Council’s proceedings. He had left the country for a few days. Government aid for Pukë families at risk The government has allocated 10 million lekë to the families of Puka who are at risk from landslides. These families lost their food supplies and their homes became uninhabitable due to the rains and landslides that swept away and eroded the soil. The government aid will finance a housing project carried out over some time for these families to benefit. But the area will also be cleared of foundations for building homes outside the danger zone. According to the Minister of Public Works this is an expensive operation.

In Durrës and Koplik the wedding guests wear mourning clothes DURRËS — After the wedding came death. V.A., 50 years old, the father of one of the groomsmen, was killed. V.A. had come from Tirana to take part in the joy of his relatives in Durrës. At the ceremony V.A. had been invited to a wedding taking place in the village of Salmone near Shijak. At that moment he had quarreled with his two cousins for still unknown reasons. On the way back after the end of the wedding, the police found him shot dead. While the police believe the cause of the conflict is related to the death. The forensic medical examination also revealed the presence of a large amount of alcohol in the victim’s body. Meanwhile, investigations into the causes and circumstances of the crime are still ongoing.

CURRENT REALITY ELBASAN — Among the olive trees lived and died S. Tafani, 56 years old — at the time of death he was living alone in an abandoned hut near an olive grove — found lifeless on Wednesday morning in the crown of an olive tree. Tafani was a poor man, but despite his little house. He was a poor man who gathered olives every day, yet he worked for lack of... without knowing days, going along the roads for slaves, shaking some here and closing them in the morning to finish. Precisely because of this, some time ago he set up his home near an acquaintance by the sea, close to his hut. And Tafani had raised his tent among the olive trees to collect olives. It was right here that the tragedy occurred. Perhaps a broken branch, perhaps a slip of the foot, and the 56-year-old lost his balance and fell to the ground. A fall that proved fatal. Tafani lost his life because he received no help from anyone. A death not solitary, just as were the days he spent in his abandoned hut among the olive trees. M. Kl.

KOPLIK — The father accidentally killed his son and the wedding turned into mourning. It happened in the home of the highlander Riza Met Geci when the celebration was at its peak. At the gunshot and the crack of the house, he was laid dead. It was the moment when the bride — accompanied by the wedding guests — was stepping over the threshold of the groom’s house in the Pojlav neighborhood of the town of Koplik. The head of the house fired a gun into the air to wish the bride prosperity and blessing in this home. But the rifle bullets struck his seven-year-old son in the head from the balcony, where he was watching the guests’ merriment in a daze. It is learned that the boy had been left vulnerable. Cries and weeping replaced the songs and joy of the wedding. The wedding guests were turned into participants in a far more painful funeral.

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