Prime Minister Edi Rama reacted publicly to SPAK's investigations into the National Agency for the Information Society (AKSHI), choosing once again his favorite format: the podcast "Flasim". Not a press conference. Not an institutional stance. But a political monologue packed with metaphors and irony.
Rama described the accusations against the director of the Albanian National Institute of Social Affairs, Mirlinda Karçanaj, who is under security custody for serious criminal charges, as "outrageous." According to him, the truth should not be sought in "700 pots of political and media soup," but only in justice.
The Prime Minister did not provide any clarification on the specific accusations that weigh on AKSHI and its director: neither on the suspected hostage-taking episodes where Mirlinda Karçanaj's name is mentioned as part of the scheme, nor on the abuses of millions of euros in AKSHI tenders, which are at the core of the SPAK investigation.
Instead, Rama chose to present Karcanaj as a key figure in the government's "digital transformation," as a symbol of governing success and not as the subject of a criminal proceeding. For 12 years of dedication, for vision, for a great breakthrough — but not a word about the accusations being investigated today.
In this story, the Prime Minister appeared today as the sole public advocate for Ms. Karçanaj.
And he performed this role from his personal podcast, which he uses to give voice to the "untouchable lady" of AKSHI — a figure who, to date, has only publicly articulated one sentence of defense: "I met Ergys Agas for personal reasons."
Meanwhile, the SPAK file talks about funds, tenders, connections, influences and criminal liability. But for this file, the prime minister seems not to have put the "pot on the fire" yet. Neither to read it, nor to contradict it with facts.
Edi Rama today, as usual, asked for patience and respect for justice, while in parallel he publicly built a political shield for an official under investigation, stripping the case of its criminal content and reducing it to a media "soup".
From what we all know, SPAK is investigating the use of public funds and the functioning of AKSH. This is the real issue. It is not metaphors, nor pots, nor merits of the past. Not even the flagrant leaks of Albanian data from Mirlinda's AKSH servers.
