Pamphlet by Thoma Gëllçi 

A year and a half has passed since the great battle between the “Marsh Owl” and the “Drug State”. It was a strong, noisy campaign. The Socialist Party did not ask for votes by showing how it would develop the country. It showed the Marsh Owl. The Democratic Party did not explain how it would govern better. It showed the Drug State.

Those were the programs of both parties.

One said: “We may not be good, but look at Berisha.” The other replied: “We may not be an alternative, but look at Rama.”

The citizen was not asked to choose the best. He was asked to determine which was the worst. The election turned into a damage contest, where each side sought votes by presenting a bill of damages caused by the opponent.

Edi Rama used to say: “We are not the best, but there is no one better than us.” A sophism, but one that, in itself, admitted that there was corruption, arrogance, concessions that devoured Albanians' money, and party administration. But they had a strong weapon: facing them was the Swamp Owl.

The Democrats accepted the role of the Swamp Owl, saying that the Owl ate lizards and snakes. They admitted that they had the same president, the same losses, and almost the same lack of reform. But they also had their answer: the Drug State was in front of them.

After the battle, where a victory of "Narkoshteti" over "Buf i Kënetës" was sanctioned, everything returned to the normal Albanian situation: neither war nor peace.

Rama continued to govern. Berisha continued to lead the opposition. One warned every morning of the return of the Owl. The other promised every evening that he was on the last mile of the collapse of the Narkoshtet.

Nobody left. Nobody changed. Only the Albanians continued to leave.

Rama needs Berisha. Without him, he would have to talk about the results of his own government. It is much easier to scare Albanians with Bufi.

Berisha needs Rama. Without him, he would have to explain why, after so many years and losses, he continues to be the only alternative for the Democratic Party. Suffice it to say that the Drug State is beating him.

That is why they fight each other and coexist without making peace. Each declares the other a national danger, but each has the other as a condition for its political survival.

This formula, which worked for years, has now encountered a problem that was not foreseen in the initial agreement: protests.

For about 50 days, tens of thousands of citizens have taken to the streets of Tirana. They are not demanding that the Drug State hand over power to the Marsh Owl. They are not even demanding that the Owl save Albania from the Drug State.

They ask both of them to leave.

The protest no longer accepts the choice between two evils. It opposes the system that has kept the country locked between two presidents, two parties, and the same reasoning: vote for us, because the others are worse.

What is not done against the protest! Some call it "ravens and crows", some say it has no head, some demand that it become a political party, some demand to find the agents of the Russian, the Serbian, the Greek, the Iranian, the Albin, the devil. But the protest continues, with the same demands and with the same intensity. The number changes, sometimes more and sometimes less, but the demands, insistence and intensity do not change.

The Protest is not a political party and does not aim to take power. It has not come out to present ministers, deputies or a governing program. Its mission is to change the system that always produces the same elections and the same winners.

The protest demands a system where citizens choose the best alternative, not calculate which is less bad. A system where candidates are chosen for their abilities and not for their proximity to the mayor, where parties have internal competition and mayors are not eternal.

This is why the "neither war nor peace" situation is breaking down.

For the first time, the Swamp Owl and the Drugstore are not facing each other. Facing them are the citizens who are no longer afraid of either the Owl or the Drugstore.

And this is the battle they both wish never started.