"On May 11, we will mark the deepest victory"/ Berisha: Albania, sunk in the pit of poverty

2025-01-09 19:14:00, Politikë CNA

"On May 11, we will mark the deepest victory"/ Berisha: Albania, sunk

Sali Berisha, meeting with the branch in Berat

The head of the Democratic Party, Sali Berisha, held a meeting with the branch in Berat this Thursday.

During his speech, he compared the country's current situation with 1991, where he said there are some incomparable similarities.

Berisha said that today's government in 12 years in power opened a great pit of poverty and because of this the Albanians fled and emptied Albania.

"Today's Albania, compared to 1991, is light years away, but the truth is, unfortunately for us, there are also some undeniable similarities.

In 1991, a pension or a salary, which at that time in depreciated money was a total of 5 to 8 dollars, I as president received 16 dollars a month.

But the prices were the same as buying something, perhaps even less than what a pensioner buys today with a 160 euro pension.

So there is a similarity here.

This government, in 12 years, opened a big hole, a terrible pit of poverty, from which the Albanians fled, fled, fled, emptied their country.

It was a historic achievement when we came out on top of countries in the region, including Romania and Bulgaria, for wages and pensions, for the first time in perhaps centuries."

Considering the poverty in the country, Berisha compared Albania with Montenegro, where he said that pensioners receive 450 euro pension, while pensioners in Albania are left to count the bites.

Berisha also spoke about the lack of medicines in hospitals and the low level of education, which have encouraged corruption and theft in the country.

"What happened these 12 years?

Others have surpassed us 4 times. The pensioner of Montenegro receives a pension of 450 euros. The Romanian receives about 750-800 euros salary today.

So, if we imagine it in a way, this one dropped the Albanians into a pit of poverty in the most heartless way.

Get this year's 8.2 billion euro budget, your entire taxes. From 8.2 billion euros, a total of 16 million euros are left to those who count the bites, which are pensioners.

Farmers who produce 20 percent of the country's domestic production are given a total of 44 million euros, half of which is taken by the state apparatus.

Excluded is education, in catastrophic decline, the schooling of our children. You know that keeping education good is a vital effort for the nation and we achieved, not in the position we wanted, but we achieved vertical ascent in the PISA test. What happened to these? As soon as their 8-year term in power was completed, Albania recorded the world's largest decline in the quality of education, 69 points. This is the truth.

What happens to hospitals? Yesterday I had a journalist in the office, to whom I am very grateful for the extraordinary work. I am a doctor, I have loved and love the profession with an extraordinary passion, but some developments in my profession today are terrifying, they are unimaginable. When you see that mothers, sisters, daughters, with serious diseases, for three years in a row, the devices for the treatment of serious diseases do not work for them. And let them get the diseases. On the other hand, he himself puts the ivory tower in his office for 5 million euros and comes out to greet the Albanians from the vase he bought for 5 million, feeding the fish.

Medicines for patients with the most serious diseases are missing.

Yesterday I talked, he has done detailed studies. That situation was not only there, it is in some services such a situation because they have encouraged theft and corruption in every cell of this state.

This is the truth.

So the victory is in your hands, it is in our hands.

But this requires, as a first law, intensive meetings with every citizen of Berat and every Albanian citizen.

In fact, today there is a front, the largest that has existed since 1991, of discontent with the government.

It is up to us to unite this front and score on May 11, the deepest victory we have ever scored."/CNA