We have walked for a long time on a road without white lines, without signs and traffic lights. On a road which in many cases has seemed like a path, like a narrow monopath that leads nowhere. Finally, this wandering through the reeds, as the old saying goes, seems to end when Albania opens negotiations for membership in the European Union on Tuesday.
This is no longer one of those intermediate stations, where both flour and bran are accepted. It is a selected door through which we will pass leaving out the scumbags of our weak, formal and corrupt democracy. Along with the arrogance and empty self-confidence of our leaders who are mocking each other like chickens on top of the manure or worse, mocking others while being the object of humor themselves.
The approval by North Macedonia of the French compromise marks not only the protocol step of opening negotiations for the full entry of Albania and Macedonia into the European Union, but much more than that, it pushes these countries 'willingly or not' into the ranks of in front of the hall, where you can no longer enter without a ticket, or where you can make noise and drink. From now on, there is only 'gambling with lek', no more shows for the eyes, no reforms on paper to win a pair of elections or to attract some funds from Brussels.
After thirty years of progressing in a transition that for many has been a lost time or worse a collective psycho-drama, Albania is finally stepping into a territory of signs, standards, regulations and traffic lights. Like any bitter cure that causes pain and suffering for the tired and sick body, this confrontation with the Europeans at the strict table of rules, has to be a difficult beginning, seemingly impossible.
We are used to living in a vegetative state of semi-legality, in a swamp where laws and rules are only half-applied, in an environment where transgression and abuse are considered skills and inalienable attributes of some.
Well, with the opening of the negotiations, we know from the beginning that no one will be able to get up from the table if the account will not be framed until the last cent. Every defect will be noted, and no money will be made if it is not corrected, every task, every standard, every reform will be recorded, and it will not be called finished if the Europeans have the signature at the bottom of the page.
From here on, our story of integration in Europe ceases to be a romantic fable, to turn into a 'marriage' contract, as Edi Rama calls it, with conditions and prerequisites for the division of property, money and descendants. We are entering the laboratory where faking blood tests is simply impossible. If you have taken doping, you do not enter the competition!
It is not certain that today the political elite of Tirana or big business and other privileged categories of this country feel good when they hear that the confrontation with the Europeans will start on Tuesday. No one likes a scanner or x-ray when they know there is something wrong with their body.
But Albania itself should be very happy that today came the day that someone from far away, without interest in elections or tenders or building permits, will listen to us or give us a slap when we deserve it. Let politicians and billionaires get used to the new reality we are entering. It is no longer a reality of fairy tales, declarations and resolutions. It is a territory of traffic lights and one-way signs, where you can no longer enter the streets of Tirana after midnight.