I don’t have a crooked nose because of drugs,” Rama says: It is the scar of the attack that sought to erase me from the place where I was born

Edi Rama responded to comments posted on social media in which the deviation of his nose was satirically linked to the use of narcotics.

In a video published after the meeting held in Pogradec, the prime minister said that the asymmetry of his nose was the result of an attack that took place years ago and that the mark would remain on his body for the rest of his life.

Rama said that comments about his nose, accompanied by insinuations about drugs, narcotics or its crooked shape, had also been fueled by algorithms that circulate in the digital sphere what he described as Albania’s “political vileness.” He explained that the deformity was the scar of an attempt to erase him from the place where he was born, grew up and lives, stressing that it was not connected to any other reason.

The prime minister added that, even when he had nothing in his hands, he wanted a country where people would stand upright and not lower their heads when asked about their origins. According to him, this is the reason he fought for this country, while today he regrets the state it has ended up in and the bad narcotics that have engulfed it, emphasizing that most young people have not experienced that history.

Rama hinted that one day he might tell a personal story—that of the things he failed to change or about which he could do nothing else.