History does not ask whether you are small or big. History only asks whether you understand the time in which you live. For decades, Albanians believed that poverty was their greatest curse. Today the danger is completely different. We are no longer insignificant. We have become important.
While America and Europe are rewriting their relationship. Turkey is projecting its power in the Balkans. Israel remains the node of the Mediterranean and the Middle East. On this new map, Albania is no longer a forgotten corner. It is part of the big game.
But this is precisely where the danger arises. In geopolitics, it is not always the one who is conquered who loses. It is often the one who is convinced that he can replace the state with the leader, and the institutions with personal relationships who loses.
The Adriatic is not simply a sea. It has become a corridor of energy, security and influence. The Balkans are no longer the periphery of Europe. The Balkans are the frontier where the interests of great powers meet.
In this sense, Sazani is not just an island. Sazani is proof. A proof of whether Albania sees territory as a national heritage, or as a bargaining chip. Whether it sees sovereignty as a responsibility, or as an asset that is put on the table according to the interests of the day.
Porto Romano is not just a port either. It geopolitically changes Albania's weight in the Mediterranean. It is proof of whether Albania thinks with the horizon of the next mandate, or with the horizon of the next generation.
Porto Romano and Sazani are not two separate projects. They are two tests of our geostrategic awareness. A nation is not measured by the number of allies with whom the leader of the day is photographed. It is measured by the strength of the institutions that protect the national interest when alliances change and interests are repositioned.
Empires rise and fall, alliances are formed and dissolved. Only states with strong institutions survive time. Albania needs friendship with everyone. With Washington, with Brussels, with Ankara, with Tel Aviv. But a small state wins when it is a connecting bridge, not a dead end. Alliances are transient. Institutions are the only guarantee of sovereignty.
Therefore, the questions are not rhetorical. The questions are existential. Does the agreement serve the national interest, or the interest of the next government? Is Albanian territory being used as a diplomatic instrument to buy proximity to global elites? Do these relationships pass through state institutions, or through the personal relationships of the leader of the day?
A small country can gain a lot from foreign investment. But it can lose even more if the institutions are weaker than the capital that comes in. All these questions are not abstract. Albanians are pouring into the streets today. And that in itself is an answer.
Algorithms can amplify a message. But they cannot produce a crisis of confidence on their own. Discontent has become permanent. It is filling the squares, not just social networks. The relationship between the state and the citizen has cracked. A relationship that cracks cannot be repaired by any communication campaign.
Meanwhile, the more Albania's geopolitical weight increases, the more the quality of the Albanian state must increase. Otherwise, Albania will not be an actor of developments. It will only be a field where others play their game.
Albanians have often found themselves at the crossroads of history. But just as often they have not understood their importance in time and turned it into a sustainable national advantage. Even today, history has placed us before the same test.
Albania has not changed its place on the map. The importance that the world gives it has changed. The challenge is whether we will know how to transform this moment into a state strength, or will we waste it as has often happened in the past.
Geography is a gift. But only the state turns it into luck. History has given us a new opportunity. The challenge is whether the Albanian state is up to its geography.
If we don't build institutions stronger than the interests of the day, it won't be geography that saves us. It will be geography that condemns us.
