Oculus News Editorial
Sometimes a single sentence says more about a political culture than hundreds of pages of political analysis.
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Halim Bufi, the Albanian emigrant from Xanthi, Greece, who traveled to Pogradec to meet Prime Minister Edi Rama, captured during an interview discussing his political support and desire to meet the leader. |
Bufi, who says he has lived in Greece for 35 years and identifies as a supporter of the Socialist Party, said he wanted to personally thank Rama for policies affecting Albanian emigrants, particularly pensions and the recognition of years worked in Greece.
But one sentence immediately stands out:
“I have great hope of meeting him. To meet him and then let me die.”
This is not merely a story about one Socialist supporter traveling five hours to meet his preferred politician.
It is a revealing example of something much deeper in Albanian political culture: the persistence of the cult of personality.
From Political Support to Personal Devotion
There is nothing abnormal about supporting Edi Rama.
There is nothing abnormal about supporting the Socialist Party.
There is nothing abnormal about believing that a government has implemented policies that have benefited you personally.
Bufi's gratitude toward Rama can therefore be perfectly legitimate.
The problem begins at another point.
When support for a politician becomes so emotionally absolute that meeting the politician is described as a final wish before death, the language stops sounding like ordinary political approval.
It begins to resemble personal devotion.
And this distinction is crucial.
A democratic citizen should be able to say:
“I support this policy.”
Or:
“I believe this government has helped people like me.”
But democracy becomes psychologically fragile when the sentence becomes:
“I need to see the leader before I die.”
The difference is not semantic.
It is the difference between supporting political ideas and venerating political personalities.
Albania's Long History of the Strongman
The phenomenon cannot be separated from Albania's modern history.
For decades under communist rule, Enver Hoxha was transformed from a political leader into the symbolic embodiment of the state.
His image was everywhere.
His words became political doctrine.
His authority became inseparable from the country itself.
The communist regime did not merely demand obedience. It cultivated a political culture in which the leader was presented as the supreme source of truth, security and national destiny.
When Hoxha died in 1985, the enormous public mourning surrounding his funeral demonstrated the extraordinary emotional power of that political mythology.
Communism eventually collapsed.
The dictatorship disappeared.
The statues came down.
But political culture does not change as quickly as political systems.
The strongman survived the fall of the regime.
Only the identity of the strongman changed.
The Strongman Without a Communist Uniform
Post-communist Albania produced another generation of personalities around whom fear, admiration and mythology could accumulate.
In the chaotic 1990s, criminal figures such as Gazmend Muça acquired almost legendary reputations among parts of society.
The phenomenon was disturbing because these figures were not simply feared.
They could also be admired.
Their appearance was copied.
Their authority was romanticized.
Their funerals could become mass events.
The lesson is uncomfortable: Albania had formally rejected the communist cult of the individual while retaining some of the psychological conditions that had allowed such a cult to flourish.
The strongman no longer needed to be a communist dictator.
He could be a gangster.
He could be a businessman.
He could be a party leader.
He could be a mayor.
He could become a prime minister.
The political costume changed.
The psychological mechanism remained.
Edi Rama and the Personalization of Albanian Politics
This is where the phenomenon surrounding Edi Rama becomes politically significant.
Rama is not simply the leader of the Socialist Party. Over the years, Albanian politics has increasingly become personalized around his figure.
His supporters frequently defend Rama the person, rather than individual government policies.
His opponents frequently attack Rama the person, rather than only criticizing specific decisions.
Both sides can therefore unintentionally reinforce the same political architecture: the idea that the country's political life revolves around one individual.
That is precisely how the cult of personality survives.
A leader's supporters say:
“Without him, nothing would happen.”
His opponents respond:
“Everything that is wrong is because of him.”
The apparently opposite positions share one fundamental assumption:
The individual is the center of everything.
And that is precisely what a mature democracy should avoid.
“I Am an Emigrant Too, But I Don't Protest”
Bufi's remarks also reveal another important aspect of political devotion.
He questioned the ongoing protests in Albania, essentially arguing that he is also an emigrant but does not participate in demonstrations.
This is significant because political loyalty can influence not only how people evaluate politicians, but how they interpret reality itself.
A government policy that benefits one group can become evidence, in the eyes of its supporters, that the government as a whole deserves loyalty.
The opposite can happen with political opponents.
A single controversial decision can become evidence that everything the government does is corrupt or illegitimate.
Both reactions are symptoms of political tribalism.
The mature democratic position is more difficult:
Support what is good. Oppose what is wrong. Change your mind when the evidence changes.
That requires citizens to separate the politician from the policy.
The cult of personality does the opposite.
The Dangerous Psychology of “Our Leader”
The most dangerous consequence of political personality cults is not necessarily propaganda.
It is identity.
When political allegiance becomes part of someone's personal identity, criticism of the leader can feel like a personal attack.
The politician is no longer merely someone elected to govern.
He becomes a symbol of one's dignity, history, political tribe and hopes.
That is when rational political debate begins to disappear.
A supporter may defend a politician even when confronted with evidence of wrongdoing.
An opponent may reject a successful policy simply because it was implemented by the wrong politician.
Both are forms of political blindness.
Bufi's statement should not be interpreted as proof that every Socialist voter worships Edi Rama.
That would itself be an irrational generalization.
But his words are valuable precisely because they expose, in an unusually direct form, the emotional extremes to which political identification can reach.
Albania Does Not Need Another Strongman
This is the larger issue.
Albania has changed leaders repeatedly.
It has changed governments.
It has changed political alliances.
It has moved from dictatorship to democracy.
It has joined NATO and integrated into European institutions.
Millions of Albanians have emigrated.
But the deeper political culture has proved harder to transform.
The question should therefore not simply be:
Who is Albania's next leader?
The more important question is:
Why does Albania repeatedly need a leader to become larger than the institutions he is supposed to serve?
A democracy cannot depend on the personality of one individual.
Not Edi Rama.
Not Sali Berisha.
Not anyone else.
Institutions must be stronger than politicians.
The law must be stronger than parties.
Citizens must be more important than leaders.
And political loyalty must never become personal worship.
The Real Measure of Democracy
The healthiest Albanian political sentence would not be:
“I love my leader.”
It would be:
“I support what he has done correctly, and I will oppose him when he is wrong.”
That is democracy.
A citizen should be able to thank a prime minister today and vote against him tomorrow.
He should be able to acknowledge a successful government program without turning its author into a national savior.
He should be able to criticize the opposition without becoming a government propagandist.
And he should never believe that the political leader is indispensable to his own existence.
Halim Bufi may have intended his words as nothing more than an emotional expression of gratitude.
But the words themselves reveal something larger.
“Let me meet him and then I can die.”
That is not simply an expression of political preference.
It is a sentence that should make Albania pause.
Because the country spent decades fighting the political system that created the cult of the individual.
The unfinished battle is against the mentality that continues to create it.
The face changes.
The party changes.
The ideology changes.
But if the psychological need for a strongman remains, the cult itself has never truly disappeared.