By: Agon Maliqi
Political scientist from Kosovo and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council
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The Washington Post writes that Albania’s socialist prime minister, Edi Rama, is facing a wave of protests against his government that has drawn international attention, especially because of ties to the Trump family’s business interests. According to the newspaper, he is perhaps the leader most focused on aesthetics and most aware of his image in the world.
From sporting sneakers at NATO summits to turning conference panels into stages for viral comedy sketches, Rama, 61, has long known how to attract media attention, well before the influencer era. He has built power through his ability as an effective communicator, even if often forceful.
Precisely for that reason, it seems natural that the most serious challenge to his 13 years in power has come from young Generation Z protesters, sharp and self-confident, who have used memes created and refined by artificial intelligence as aesthetic weapons to blunt many of the prime minister’s strengths.
Formed as an artist and painter, Rama rose in the early 2000s as mayor of Tirana, building the profile of an eccentric “anti-politician.” He cursed sluggish bureaucrats in front of cameras and gave the city’s dreary communist facades bright colors. He also promoted the idea that art in public spaces could drive community change.
As prime minister, he has devoted much energy not only to transforming once-gray Tirana, but also Albania’s Mediterranean coastline. Modern skyscrapers, luxury resorts, and reconstructed public spaces have turned one of Europe’s poorest countries into an attractive tourist destination, while also drawing the attention of renowned architects and artists from around the world.
Young Albanians, however, have not been so impressed by the politician who turned from painter into head of government. So far, their discontent has appeared more in emigration statistics than in street protests. Until now.
Just as the Arab Spring was sparked by a viral video of a Tunisian street vendor who set himself on fire, in this case a single incident unleashed long-accumulated frustrations among young Albanians.
When local residents and environmentalists in the coastal village of Zvërnec, where a new tourist resort linked to Jared Kushner, a Qatar-based fund, and local oligarchs is planned, protested the fencing off of a public beach near a protected natural area, two private security workers dragged one local resident through the sand while the police stood by without intervening. The public reaction was immediate.
What began as a solitary protest in a remote village quickly spread to the capital and grew to such a scale that mainstream media, which often self-censor, could no longer ignore it. Nearly four weeks have passed, and demonstrations are now taking place every day, with the flamingo, the bird characteristic of Albania and threatened by the resort’s construction, serving as a unifying symbol.
These protests are both angry and demanding the downfall of the entire political establishment. As in many other Generation Z uprisings, political solidarity has spread through humor and memes. A generation of Albanians that had so far remained silent is now experiencing a new sense of dignity and political empowerment.
Western media have mainly presented the protests as opposition to Kushner’s project, an angle that is easier for their audiences to grasp.
But the real concerns are entirely tied to domestic governance. Tens of thousands of Albanians of different ideological beliefs — liberals, nationalists, environmentalists, Marxists, fashion influencers, and even conspiracy theorists — gather every evening because they feel excluded and neglected by an elite that cares only about its own interests, including the formal parliamentary opposition, the Democratic Party, which they say has for years allowed public assets to be stripped away through shady deals with interest groups. Kushner’s resort is only the latest and most visible example.
Rama has tried to argue that luxury tourism projects like Kushner’s are the future of Albania’s economy. The demonstrators do not accept that logic. Albania remains a poor country, and a development model based mainly on construction and tourism has enriched only people linked to power, while ordinary citizens increasingly struggle to afford even a summer holiday on the coast.
Even more troubling is the fact that the tourism sector is using low-paid migrant workers to cut costs, while Albanians themselves continue emigrating to the West in search of work.
The widespread corruption in Rama’s government has also become unacceptable to citizens. His recent refusal to strip parliamentary immunity from his former deputy prime minister, who faces an indictment, is creating a serious obstacle on Albania’s path toward European Union membership. It is also seen as a broader threat to rule-of-law reforms demanded by the European Union and the United States, which Rama until recently had embraced as his own.
The results of Generation Z protests around the world have been mixed, and Albania will not go to elections until 2029. Still, these protests have achieved one important thing: they have damaged the reputation of the charismatic prime minister as a man who always manages to get out of difficult situations through his communication skills.
His attempts to portray the protesters as out-of-touch influencers and to appropriate their symbol by wearing a flamingo T-shirt have failed, at best.
A new generation is learning how to turn public discontent into electoral force. And for the first time in his long career, Rama no longer appears to have the last word.
That could cost him more.
