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Kostë Çekrezi, a journalist before the government

2024-08-29 19:31:00, Kulturë CNA

At the beginning of September 1928, when Albania had just become a kingdom and President Ahmet Zogu had been proclaimed King, an incident occurred in Tirana.

Konstandin Çekrezi, professor of philosophy who ran the newspaper Telegraf, had an argument with the Minister of Justice Hiqmet Delvina, who became so irritated that he threatened him with a revolver.

The event took place in the offices of the Ministry of the Interior, where Prime Minister Koço Kotta was also present at the time, who stopped Delvina's hand.

The reason for the quarrel was that in an editorial of the Telegraph, the 36-year-old Çekrezi had insulted the government, calling it "a temporary cabinet."

It was not long before the government closed the newspaper.

Kostë Çekrezi, from Ziçishti i Korça, was a learned man with a Harvard degree.

He had gone to Tirana in the early 1920s from Washington, where he had served for about two years as commissioner of Albania (ambassador without official accreditation) and where he had taught history at the National University. He was also the author of the book in English about the history of Albania, Albania Past and Present, published in New York in 1919.

Çekrezi's dream was to spread in Albania the American principles of freedom of the press; he wanted a journalism free from government censorship.

Immediately after the closure of the newspaper, Çekrezi sent a telegram to the Associated Press news agency in Vienna, informing it of the government's act and saying that his life was in danger.

The same day he went to the US Legation in Tirana, where he requested political asylum on the grounds that he had served for a time as a lawyer appointed by the US Attorney General to mediate the purchase of the land for the new Legation building, where it is located today American embassy.

The US Minister Plenipotentiary in Tirana, Charles Hart, told him that he could not help him. He took Çekrezi aside and in a friendly conversation reminded him of the advice he had given him earlier that if he tried at all costs to manage a newspaper in Albania according to his American ideals, he would end up behind bars or thrown into road.

In fact, the Çekrez rebel was way ahead of his time. He was arrested and the Tirana court sentenced him to one year in prison, although according to those who heard him in the courtroom, he defended himself quite well and eloquently.

According to American Minister Hart, when Çekrezi was arrested, Prime Minister Koço Kotta wanted his opponent to be punished by execution, as was done a year before with two Bulgarians and an Albanian who were sentenced to be hanged, even though the evidence against them had not been compelling.

Prime Minister Kotta and Minister Delvina were the ones who felt most insulted in this story.

And here's why.

When Çekrezi declared in his editorial that Kotta's government according to the law was temporary, he used the French expression "Cabinet de Service" for the Albanian cabinet.

The plenipotentiary minister of Italy in Tirana, Ugo Sola, went to Prime Minister Kotta's office, to whom he told that Çekrezi had seriously insulted the government, because "Cabinet de Service" in Albanian was translated as "necessary". The prime minister did not know French and was very irritated after what Sola told him.

He was so angry that he did not want to listen to the other cabinet ministers who told him that Çekrezi had not used the expression in the sense of needy.

Çekrezi spent only three weeks in prison and was pardoned by King Zog in mid-October 1928.

But the rebel remained a rebel.

In 1932, he was imprisoned again for taking part in an uprising against the King, escaped to Italy, crossed to France and ended up back in the USA.

Kostë Çekrezi died in Arlington near Washington in 1959.

(The documents are extracted from the American archive)/ CNA