Edi Rama
Edi Rama is an Albanian politician, artist, and writer who has served as prime minister of Albania since 2013 and as chairman of the Socialist Party of Albania since 2005. He was the Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports from 1998 to 2000 and the mayor of Tirana from 2000 to 2011.
A coalition of centre-left parties led by Rama in the 2013 parliamentary election defeated the incumbent centre-right coalition led by Sali Berisha of the Democratic Party of Albania. Rama was appointed prime minister for additional terms following parliamentary elections in 2017, 2021, and 2025.
Rama is the only Albanian prime minister to have won four consecutive terms. During Rama's tenure, Albania has seen economic growth but also democratic backsliding, with various sources describing his rule as autocratic. Albania has also continued to suffer from emigration.
Rama was one of the initiators of Open Balkan, an economic zone of the Western Balkan countries intended to guarantee the "Four Freedoms".
Early life and career
Edi Rama was born Edvin Kristaq Rama on 4 July 1964 in Tirana, he is the first of two children of Kristaq and Aneta Rama. His father was Kristaq Rama, a well-known sculptor born in Durrës who created numerous statues during the communist era in Albania and had close ties to the communist regime. Kristaq Rama was a signatory to the 1988 death sentence of opposition poet Havzi Nela. His great-grandfather, also named Kristaq Rama, was an intellectual who advocated for Albanian independence and schools, and he originated from Berat before later relocating to Durrës. Other ancestors from his paternal side come from the southeastern village of Dardhë, near Korçë. His mother, Aneta Rama , was a graduate of medicine from the southwestern village of Vuno, Vlorë, and a great-niece of Spiro Koleka, a member of the Politburo during Communist Albania. Rama states that the Koleka family, going back some centuries, is of northern Mirditor origin, and that the surname was derived from Kol Leka.Rama started painting early in his childhood. During his teenage years, his talent was noticed by two influential Albanian painters of the time, Edi Hila and Danish Jukniu. They encouraged Rama to further develop his painting skills in a professional context. He attended and graduated from the Jordan Misja Artistic Lyceum, an art school in Tirana. As a teenager, Rama played professional basketball for Dinamo Tirana and was also part of the Albania national basketball team. and was also an interpreter for Italian club Scavolini Libertas when they played against Partizani Tirana in 1988 In 1982, he enrolled in the Academy of Arts in Tirana. After graduating, Rama started working as an instructor at the Academy of Arts. During this time, he organized several open student meetings, during which the Albanian communist government was publicly criticized. Essays from those meetings were collected in the book Refleksione, which Rama published together with publicist Ardian Klosi in 1992.
Shortly before the fall of communism in Albania, Rama attempted several times to get involved with the incipient fight for democracy. He tried to influence student protests and become part of the newly created Democratic Party of Albania but soon left after a quarrel over ideological matters with Sali Berisha. In 1994, Rama moved to France, and tried to begin a career as a painter. He and his former student, Anri Sala, exhibited their works in several art galleries. On 27 November 2002, Rama officially changed his first name to Edi.
Political career
During one of his trips back to Albania in January 1997, Rama suffered a physical assault. While the perpetrators were never found, there were concerns over the involvement of the State Secret Service given Rama's outspoken criticism towards the Albanian government.In 1998, while in Albania for the funeral of his father, Rama was offered a cabinet position by then-Prime Minister of Albania Fatos Nano. Later that year he was appointed Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports. As a Minister, Rama immediately became known for his extravagance in a variety of ways, including his unique colorful dressing style. His innovative cultural projects, coupled with his unusual clothing and rebellious political style, helped him attract a great level of support.
Mayor of Tirana (2000–2011)
In October 2000, the Socialist Party of Albania endorsed Rama in the election for Mayor of Tirana. The Democratic Party nominee was Besnik Mustafaj, a writer and diplomat. Rama won 57% of the vote, and was sworn in as mayor. After taking office, he undertook a radical campaign of bulldozing hundreds of illegal constructions and restoring many areas near Tirana's center and Lanë River into their initial form.Rama began an initiative in 2004 to repaint Tirana's degrading Hoxha-era apartment blocks using more vibrant colors. The repainting helped transform the aesthetics of areas dominated by the Soviet-style buildings. Rama was awarded the inaugural World Mayor Prize in 2004. The award committee, explained their decision stating that "Edi Rama is the man who changed a whole city. Now there is a new Tirana, colored, happy, with a new and improved infrastructure and cultural life".
As mayor he compiled the Tirana City Master Plan including the Skanderbeg Square project. He planted thousands of new trees, making Tirana a much more environment-friendly city. Rama also expanded the existing roads and paved new ones, improving mobility. According to a UNDP report Rama played a critical role in the modernization of the local government, empowering municipalities and giving them, for the first time real power to impact the life of their communities.
Rama was reelected Mayor of Tirana by defeating Democratic Party candidates Spartak Ngjela, a former attorney, in 2003, and Sokol Olldashi in 2007. In 2011, Rama decided to run for a fourth term in office. His opponent, Lulzim Basha was a member of Prime Minister Berisha's cabinet. Rama's reelection bid failed in a hotly contested election, after a court ruling decided hundreds of ballots mistakenly cast in the wrong ballot boxes were valid. The initial count saw Rama ahead by 10 votes. With all ballots counted Lulzim Basha won the race by 81 votes. Rama appealed the court's decision at the Electoral College and demanded the reinstatement of the initial tally. Rama's appeals were rejected, and Basha was sworn in as the new Mayor of Tirana. Rama and the Socialist Party criticized the judges involved in the court ruling.
Leader of the opposition (2005–2013)
Having previously run as an independent in 2000, Rama registered as a Socialist in 2003. Later that year he announced a bid for the chairmanship of the Party. He and Rexhep Meidani, former President, ran against the incumbent, Fatos Nano. Rama's bid failed to gain sufficient support from the Assembly delegates. He received 41 votes, Rexhep Meidani received 61, while Fatos Nano was reelected with 456 votes.After the center-left coalition lost in the 2005 parliamentary election, Fatos Nano resigned as Chairman of the Socialist Party. In the subsequent election for the chairmanship of the Party, Rama defeated Rexhep Meidani 297 to 151 and became the Chairman of the Socialist Party. Capitalising on Rama's popularity as a mayor, the Socialist Party of Albania regained some of its appeal. Rama replaced many of the Party's influential leaders with younger loyalists. In his earlier attempts to regain control in the Parliament, he tried to frame himself as a political outsider. Inspired by the progressive policies of Tony Blair's "New Labour" and Anthony Giddens "Third Way", his political platform called for a "third direction beyond the traditional right and left".
As the minority leader, Rama threw his support behind a set of constitutional amendments introduced in the Parliament during the summer of 2008. These amendments changed Albania's election law from a majoritarian representation with a proportional adjustment into a party-list proportional representation as well as curtailed Presidential powers. Despite criticism and protests from President Bamir Topi and MPs from the Socialist Movement for Integration and other smaller political parties, the amendments were passed in the Parliament with a super-majority.
Rama's reelection as mayor in 2007 was greatly helped by the Socialist Movement for Integration's endorsement of his candidacy. Seeing the 2008 constitutional amendments voted by Rama's SPA as a serious threat to their existence in Albanian politics, Ilir Meta and the SMI did not join Rama in a pre-electoral coalition for the 2009 parliamentary election. The Socialist Party led by Rama were only able to win 66 seats in the Parliament. Incumbent prime minister Berisha's Democratic Party won 70 seats, while the remaining 4 seats went to Ilir Meta's Socialist Movement for Integration. Demands by Rama and the Socialists for a recount in the district of Fier were rejected by courts amidst criticism about the judge's impartiality. Eventually, all four newly elected SMI members of the parliament voted support for Prime Minister Berisha's Democrats.
The 2009 election's narrow defeat prompted Rama to continue his mandate as chairman of the Socialist Party. The Socialist Party opted for a hardcore dispute of the newly elected government by boycotting parliamentary debates for months and staging a hunger strike to prompt for domestic and foreign attention to the situation. The heated political debate surrounding the 2009 election has been pointed out as one reason for Albania's failed bid at gaining official candidate status in accession talks with the EU.
In January 2011, a recorded videotape showed Deputy Prime Minister Ilir Meta negotiating informal pay-to-play fees with Dritan Prifti, Minister for the Economy, Commerce and Energy. On 21 January 2011, clashes broke out between police and protesters in an anti-government rally in front of the Government building in Tirana. Four people were shot dead by government special forces. The EU issued a statement to Albanian politicians, warning both sides to refrain from violence.