“Private” is not enough!

By Arian Galdini

When a government says that a piece of land is private property, it has not closed the question. In Albania, especially on the coast, it has often only opened it.

Private property is one of the foundations of freedom.

It protects the human being from the arbitrariness of the state, from the crowd that wants to decide over everything, from the party that seeks to give itself a right over the lives of others, from the office that turns the citizen into a petitioner, from power that wants to treat life as its own property.

A country that does not protect property does not protect the human being.

But precisely because private property is so important, it cannot be used as a closing word over a history the public does not know.

In a country with long property wounds, with delayed restitution, overlapping claims, decisions that have changed the fate of families, protected areas that are softened, maps the public sees late, and permits granted quickly but disclosed slowly, the word “private” is not always proof of calm.

It is the beginning of the test.

It is not enough to say that something is private.

It must be seen how it became so, when it became so, from whom it was taken, to whom it was passed, by what decision, after which change of status, through which chain of companies, after what public silence, and upon which procedure the citizen has not seen.

Here begins the deeper question of Zvërnec.

It is not enough to ask who is building.

We must ask who made the building possible.

It is not enough to be told that the land is private.

We must know how this ownership was created, how it was held, how it was transferred, how it was connected to the project, and what the state changed before the public knew the truth.

A government does not need to own a project in order to bear political responsibility for it.

It is enough that it has built the road.

It is enough that it has changed the rules, the status, the boundaries, the facilities, the language, and the public rhythm in such a way that the project enters faster than the citizen, faster than the document, faster than the environment, and faster than the right.

This is not an accusation of personal ownership.

It is an accusation about the architecture of the state.

In this model, the state does not always give away the land.

Sometimes it gives away the rule.

And when the state gives away the rule, the land loses its protection before the public understands what has happened.

In the case of the Pishë Poro - Nartë area, the public facts require a cold reading.

Reports have shown that the company “Zvërnec South Adriatic Development” received a development permit for a massive tourism project in 2025, while the permits had not been disclosed at the time of reporting; the case has also been linked to debate over ownership, environmental impact, and changes to the rules governing protected areas.

Environmental organizations and public actors have raised concerns about Pishë Poro - Nartë and about the effect of Law 21/2024 on protected areas.

At the same time, the company has publicly stated that the land is private property and that the investment will be large.

Precisely here the obligation of the state begins, not to ask for trust, but to give proof.

Public order is not maintained with declarations.

It is maintained with documents.

If the status of the area has been changed, the public has the right to know why.

If protection has been softened, the public has the right to know by what scientific and public reasoning.

If the law has opened the way for tourism in sensitive areas, the public has the right to know why the interest of investment moved faster than care for the place.

If a company with foreign corporate links and ultimate beneficiaries still needing disclosure receives a permit for a massive project in territory of national and environmental value, the public does not need reassurance.

It needs the map, the ownership, the permit, the environmental assessment, and the full chain of responsibility.

Foreign capital is not the problem.

Unclear capital over sensitive territory is a problem of the Republic.

A serious state does not treat transparency as an attack on investment.

It treats transparency as the condition that prevents investment from becoming a source of mistrust.

A serious investor does not enter a country behind a wall of lawyers and too little light.

He enters with documents that make suspicion unnecessary.

In Albania, the word “strategic” risks becoming the elegant name of privilege.

An investment may be large, but size does not sanctify it.

It may bring jobs, but employment does not cleanse the darkness of ownership.

It may bring tourism, but tourism does not annul the environment.

It may carry international names, but a name does not replace procedure.

It may promise the future, but a future that seeks to pass over the public question is not yet development.

It is priority disguised as development.

A protected area is not a reserve of land for the government’s tourism dream.

It is a public boundary against private appetite.

Where the state changes that boundary, it must give a greater explanation, not a smaller one.

Where the law opens the way for intervention in sensitive spaces, the state must be more careful, not more impatient.

Where the coastline, the lagoon, the forest, the road, the water, access, and the memory of the place enter the language of a project, the government cannot answer only with private property.

Property has an owner, but the place has stewardship.

A coastline may be divided into plots, but it cannot be completely separated from the public interest.

A parcel may have a certificate, but a landscape is never only a certificate.

An investor may have a contract, but a contract does not extinguish the state’s duty to protect nature, access, memory, and public trust.

Here Rama bears his greatest responsibility, not because he must be declared owner of the project without proof, but because he is politically responsible for the architecture that made the project possible.

He has the government.

He has the law.

He has the National Territorial Council.

He has the public language.

He has the power to change the status, to open permits, to defend a model, to say “private” when the public asks to know more.

Rama must not be asked only what is being built.

He must be asked what rule was changed, what boundary was moved, what document was not disclosed, what right was silenced, and what citizen was left at the end so that construction could become possible.

This is the model, development as appearance, the state as accelerator, the citizen as delay, the environment as detail, property as a closing word, the investor as the future announced before the public sees the truth.

For this model, territory is not a lived place.

It is a stage on which the image of power is placed.

The image of the project replaces the map.

The international photograph replaces the hearing.

The word “excellence” replaces the boundary.

The word “strategic” replaces competition.

The word “private” replaces investigation.

And when the citizen asks to see, he is told that development must not be obstructed.

But the citizen is not asking to stop development.

He is asking not to be excluded from the truth.

In Zvërnec, the truth is not only at the fence.

The fence is the consequence.

The truth is in the paper that made the fence feel possible.

That is where the light must enter: into the property, the map, the chain, the ultimate beneficiary, the permit, the environmental assessment, the decision that changed protection, the reason why a territory of public value enters the language of a private project.

And when this truth is delayed until the moment the citizen faces private force, the issue enters its gravest degree.

Private property is not a private state.

No investor, however large, however international, however covered with promises of jobs, can have a private force that appears faster than public law.

When the citizen asks for the file and receives spray, we no longer have only a property debate.

We have a crisis of the state.

We have the question of whether the Republic is still master of its own moral force.

This is not language against investment.

It is language for the Republic.

Private property must be protected.

Investment must be welcomed.

Serious capital must enter.

But all of these must pass through the same door: open law, the document first, clean property, verified environment, an impartial state, and the citizen heard.

If protest breaks the law, the protester answers.

If private security crosses the line, it answers.

If the police make a mistake, the police answer.

If the government has changed the rules to make the project possible, the government answers.

If the property is clean, it is proven.

If it is not, the word “private” is not enough.

This is the order of a Republic, not who shouts louder, not who has more money, not who has more guards, not who has more connections, not who calls himself strategic, but who proves his right before the law and the public.

Even an opposition that wakes only when the machinery is on the ground and the camera is on is not innocent.

Laws, government decisions, changes to maps, the lowering of protection, the architecture of strategic investments, permits, companies, and fences are not born overnight.

A serious opposition does not wait for the spray to understand that the state has begun to lose its boundary.

A serious government does not wait for the video to remember that the citizen has a body, dignity, and the right to an explanation.

At this point, the demand is simple, but it is not technical. It is the order of the Republic.

The state must open the map of ownership, the chain of property transfers, the ultimate beneficiaries, the reasoning behind the change of protection, the permits, the environmental assessment, and every document that turns this private project into a public question.

If everything is clean, none of this harms the project.

If these documents are not opened, then the problem is no longer the citizen’s suspicion, but the state’s fear of proof.

Works must be suspended until the file is complete in the eyes of the public, and every use of force, every police error, every role of private security must be investigated seriously, not with calming language.

These are not demands against development.

They are the conditions that prevent development from turning into power over the place.

In Zvërnec, what is being asked is not that Albania should not develop.

What is being asked is that Albania not develop by ceasing to recognize itself.

What is being asked is not that capital be stopped, but that capital enter with light.

What is being asked is not that private property be denied, but that its history be visible.

What is being asked is not that tourism be destroyed, but that tourism not rise upon a place no longer asked about its own truth.

The land may be private, but the truth about the land is public.

The investment may be large, but the Republic is larger.

And when the citizen asks to see the file, the state has no right to show him the fence, the private hand, and the spray.

It has the duty to show him the truth.

Because a country does not lose only when land is taken from it.

It also loses when the truth about the land arrives after the fence, the permit, the money, and force have occupied the place where the law should have stood.

Arian Galdini