Erion Veliaj, a few hours ago reacted through a video message where he commented on the demolition of the National Theater, the anger of the activists and the construction of the new facility.
The mayor today called it very difficult, but the decision taken, right. He began the statement with a brief history of the Theater, then listed the reasons for its collapse, mentioning all the discussions that have taken place over the past two and a half years.
"Today was a day when we had to make the right decision, but extremely difficult. I say the right decision because the discussion about a new theater has been a discussion for 70 years, since the time when a few years of war ended, to open another discussion, what will we have as a permanent building of the National Theater. That building was invented over the years as for the popular courts of that time, but then for other functions, then also the cinema, then theater again, then bingo and theater again, an extremely depreciated building.
We started this discussion, that is, this last round of discussions of these three years, when we proposed a new theater with the transfer of the new administration in the Municipality of Tirana. We had a project for the New Bazaar, the New Boulevard, for a new River Bank, for a new part of the Lake, for a New Square, a new Castle and of course, for a New Theater, along with many schools, roads and new investments that suit Tirana for the last 100 years. "
At the end of his speech, he asked the citizens to prepare some lessons while preparing for the new theater, emphasizing that all the "noise" in the end will be forgotten because what will be remembered is the product.
The old theater is gone, now we are preparing for the new theater. But as we prepare for the new theater, we need to learn a few lessons. One of the lessons we need to learn is that we need to cooperate; we need to work together to improve this idea. We have some very good ideas that have enriched the project by artists, but I believe we can do even better.
Today I want to extend my hand to anyone who disagreed with us in this battle; anyone who probably, even though he does not have the engineering expertise, even though he does not have the legal expertise to understand how these processes work, or maybe even the basic knowledge that, not only was he never a monument, but that in 2018 he was endangered, and as seen today after the demolition, was all the populace, sawdust, tin. We didn?t see a concrete column, an armature, a gram of steel. That building was really dangerous and could not be the building to take the children of this city to the next 100 years. You can?t go on with blankets in the winter or with towels, sweat porridge in the summer. We need a modern theater. "
You can listen to the full speech of the mayor here:
