TIRANA – “The image of the Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and the representatives of the religious communities in Albania who marched in the Paris’ streets staying side by side to each other is still in the memory of many French people. Certainly we come from different countries, our history is not the same and we have different religions but we should take a lesson from the example of Albania, especially in this period of aguish and tension: It is possible to have coexistence, harmony and peace between different religions as this already happens in Albania,” President of the Observatory of Secularism Jean-Louis Bianco declared in an exclusive interview with Albanian Daily News Editor-in-Chief Genc Mlloja.

During the interview, Mr. Bianco explained the term laicite while he said that abolition of religion by law in Albania in 1966 gave the people the right to choose whether to believe or not.

Speaking about Albania and its up to date development, he said that our country has made a huge progress in both terms of infrastructure and economy as well as in the political aspect, focusing mainly on Albania’s perspective to join the EU.

The full interview continues as follows:

-Mr. Bianco, considering your long and successful career but also different posts you have held, could you please tell us which is the opinion of France, French government and your personal view on Albania, Albanians and the developments in our country?

-First of all, I want to thank you for having this interview. What I would like to note is that I have an affective relation with Albania. My children have close friendship with Albanian families who were settled in France around 50 years ago. On the other hand, I have also had the opportunity to meet Ismail Kadare several times in Paris where we have talked about the history of Albania. So, I want to proclaim myself as a friend of Albania, a real friend.

Now turning to your question, I think that before talking about Albania, you should know its extraordinary history first. It has an old, glorious and heroic history which it should be said that is not that much known in France.

I haven’t been in Albania since nine years and I can say that I was impressed from the transformation and progress it has made during these years at a rapid pace. The change is seen especially when you see the roads, the buildings, machineries, etc. But, this is also seen in the efforts made by the Albanian governments in the framework of Albania’s perspective to join one day the family of the European Union. In this regard, there have been made several efforts and were taken some brave and important decisions that I want to praise.

However, there are still many things to be done but the positive thing is that Albanian authorities as well as Albanian people are aware of what they should do. In my view, considering its geographical position, Albania is in the heart of Europe. And, considering also its historic, political and diplomatic past, I believe that in the future, Albania will play a very important role in the equilibriums of not only the region but also Europe.

-Well, your last sentence is very important and as a journalist I highly appreciate it. But, in the meetings you might have had with our political class, both majority and opposition members, do they feel what you said?

-Actually, I don’t know the Albanian internal politics that well as to respond correctly to your question. But my argument is based on the geo-political point of view. Considering the way how the Albania’s foreign policy is being developed and Albania’s perspective to join EU, I believe that Albania can have that role. Then, everything depends on what authorities and people will do.

-We and our readers know you from the social networks, but would you kindly tell our readers something more than everybody can find on internet about Jean-Louis Bianco, a well-known politician having served close to President Francois Mitterrand and currently President of the Observatory of Secularism?

-In fact I have been lucky. I have never run after any post but I have had the chance to get to know men and women who have supported me and wanted me to work with them. They have given me the opportunity to do things that I like to do, thus choosing to do what I have always wanted to do.

Meantime, I am also special councilor to the Minister of Environment and I would like to note that it seems like the public opinion in Albania and politics doesn’t understand the fact that the Albanian policies in the field of environment are very good and its standing is great compared to what was expected from the country.

On the other side, Albania, apart from qualifying to France 2016, has also become part of COP21. Actually, we are very glad that Albania reached the qualification as there are many football players in your national team who have also played in France. I am a fan of Marseille and I don’t forget the fact that your captain Lorik Cana played very good for Marseille. On the other hand, you also did a great job during Albania-Serbia football match.

French Ambassador Bernard Fittousi: Can I add something about Mr. Bianco? When I was graduated at the Public Administration High School in France, I heard that Mr. Bianco who at that time was a member of the High State Council, thus a high level post, had resigned that post and became the member of a small union, in a very small municipality. We all asked ourselves why he did such thing. How could this happen? And, from that time, Mr. Bianco has been an example for all of us as the man who didn’t choose the career but the life and way how he wants to live it.

- Now coming to something concrete. Pork or nothing: how school dinners are dividing France. This was the headline of a story on a religious controversial question carried by The Guardian on October 13 this year which wrote as following: Jean-Louis Bianco, who heads national consulting body the Observatory of Secularism, has warned that the scrapping of pork-free school dinners is a “typical” example of secularism being used for political ends. “Why create a problem where there isn’t a problem?” he asked. What can you say more about this?

-Well, thank you for reading on such issue in details and I will explain this situation to you. The Observatory of Secularism that I chair is independent body and many ministers, lawmakers, scientific researchers, personalities, etc, are part of it. First of all, I would like to explain the meaning of laicite. The word “laicite” is translated as secularism in English but it is not the same thing. There are three main principles that define this word. Laicite is first of all the freedom to believe, not believe and the freedom to change religion.

The second principle is the independence of state from any religion and neutrality of the state administration who shouldn’t manifest signs of their religion at the work place. The third principle which is more related to the French laicite is that we differ very much from each other, coming from different countries and religions but what unites us all is the citizenship. Citizenship as well as rights and obligations to state unite us despite political beliefs, religion, race, etc.

But, there are cases when the laicite which is accepted by all (both state and the church) is manipulated and used for certain political reasons. The word laicite, when mentioned by the head of the National Front, is a ‘weapon’ against the Muslim community and Islamic religion. Coming to your concrete question, I can say that in schools there are different requests; there are some students who don’t want to eat pork, some others want ‘hallall’ meat while there are also others who don’t want to eat meat at all as they are vegetarian, etc.

In our practice, we usually tell these schools to offer choices. This is good for the students’ health but also meets the needs and demands of those who are vegetarian. Those who don’t want to eat pork, then, they don’t have to eat such meat.

What I have said is that it is not in our French nature to force all students to eat pork without having the right to choose. Anyway, this is only an isolated case because in most of the schools there isn’t such situation.

-Albania is commonly mentioned as an example of the religious harmony and tolerance where four different religions co-exist.  Do you really think deep down that ‘co-existence’ is genuine? What would you like to say about such relations?

-Well, I was also talking today with the French Ambassador and some Albanian friends about this issue and we were all saying that Albania is a model of religious coexistence, harmony and tolerance. Actually, it is still in the memory of many Frenchmen the image of the Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama and the representatives of the religious communities in Albania who marched in the Paris’ street staying side by side to each other.

Certainly we come from different countries, our history is not the same and we have different religions but we should take a lesson from the example of Albania, especially in this period of aguish and tension: It is possible to have coexistence, harmony and peace between different religions as this already happens in Albania.

-Let’s go back in time now as Albania is probably one of the only country which abolished by law religion in 1966. How did you experience such a things in your country? On the other hand, few days it was also marked the day of Mother Teresa beautification.

-The whole world knows Mother Teresa, her personality and her works and everyone knows she was Albanian. She is a model for the entire humanity. The return of laicite was a freedom; freedom to chose whether you want to believe or not. Thus, Albanians became free to make such choice. Because we all know that there are believers but there are also laics or people who don’t believe at all, thus different forms of reactions to religion.

- Religion and politics. Sometimes they have points of contact. In the case of Albania politics is polarized, there is an ongoing fierce fight between the various camps. But the contrary is said about religion and as I mentioned above there is an exceptional religious harmony. How can religion help with its example to influence on a thaw among Albania’s politicians who, it’s not much to say, consider themselves not as political adversaries but as enemies?

-As I said, I wouldn’t like to make any comment on the Albanian politics but still, I can give my view on politics in general. I think that politicians should have their ideas clear and strong but to strongly believe in a cause or issue doesn’t mean to be doctrinal or aggressive.

However, in an ideal politics, they should find the issues on which the majority and the opposition can’t agree at all, there are also other issues on which the parties play their role, thus the opposition does the tactic opposition, it is a political maneuver. 

In my political career, I have been in both majority and opposition. In local level, as president of a department I have managed to have unanimity for the approval of five budgets. Although I had the qualified majority, still, I always declared that the biggest work was done by the opposition as they had the most difficult task. They had to listen to our proposals and projects, discuss with us and approve them.

In my opinion, people do not want to watch politics as a box match although media tries to highlight the conflicts. I think that they don’t want to see a caricature of debates but real debates on issues that concern them.

-Dear Mr. Bianco, there is also another issue that I would like to ask and have your opinion. Currently, Europe is facing with the crisis of refugees. Last night, while closing our daily work at the editorial, we were watching on TV crowds of refugees in the Croatian-Slovenian border. How do you see such grave situation and the stance held by the European Union on this crisis?

-It is an extremely difficult question. First of all, it is terrible to see how these people travel for days just to find a place where to live. There is no ideal solution. Certainly, we can’t close the borders but on the other side, we can’t welcome all the unfortunates of the world.

EU was a bit late to understand what was happening that is a real humanitarian crisis. But now it has a satisfactory standing. There is a chain of decisions that should be taken, decisions that can’t be taken separately but together.

However, what I want to reiterate is that we have to help more those countries which are trying to keep their work force at home. We should assist in the developments of these countries. On the other hand, we should also negotiate and help the countries where the refugees pass through so that they create the appropriate conditions to them during their transit. This is what Europe should do with Turkey. The refugees should be received in a dignified and correct way. But we should also hit without mercy all those who want to make fortune with human trafficking.

Then, what is most difficult issue is that we in France but also Europe should receive the political refugees, thus who leave from the war. But we don’t have the material, political, psychological capacities to also receive all those who come to find a job.

In this context, it is needed that both France and Germany find the ways of cooperation just like it happened in the last summit between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Francois Hollande.