Belinda Balluku was one of the leading figures in Albania's parliamentary elections held a week ago (April 25) as she was the woman who received the most crosses across the country.
Το επίθετο Balluku λέει πολλά για τους Αλβανούς. Ο παππούς της 48χρονης υπουργού του Ράμα Belinda Balluku, ήταν ένας από τους πιο στενούς συνεργάτες του δικτάτορα Enver Hoxha, είχε διατελέσει μάλιστα αντιπρόεδρος της δικτατορικής κυβέρνησης και υπουργός Άμυνας. Το 1974 ο «Πατακός» της Αλβανίας Beqir Balluku καταδικάστηκε σε θάνατο. Είχε χαρακτηριστεί μάλιστα από τον δικτάτορα ως ο μεγαλύτερος εχθρός της κομουνιστικής Αλβανίας. Ο Χότζα είχε κάνει το ίδιο με πολλούς συνεργάτες του αλλά οι περιπτώσεις των Mehmet Shehu, Beqir Balluku και Kadri Hasbiu ήταν αυτές που άφησαν εποχή στην 50χρονη δικτατορία. Την περίοδο 1974-1991, η σύζυγος και τα παιδιά του Balluku, σέρνονταν ως εξόριστοι σε διάφορα χωριά της Αλβανίας.
After the fall of the dictatorship in the early 1990s, the family of the then 18-year-old Belinda, like many other Albanian families, immigrated to Greece. In her biography, she states that in the early years she worked in various jobs in Athens like all immigrants, while later she studied, without mentioning where she worked or what she studied.
In 1999, Belinda Balluku returned to Tirana, as an associate of Cosmote's powerful man Stefanos Oktapodas, who had undertaken to set up and manage the first mobile telephony company in Albania, AMC (a subsidiary of Cosmote).
From 2004 to the present, Balluku has been one of Edi Rama's closest associates, both when he was governing the Municipality of Tirana from 2004 to 2011, and in the government from 2013 to 2021. In January 2019, Rama entrusted her with one of the most important ministries, Infrastructure and Energy, a position she holds to this day.
According to other Albanian publications that oppose the minister, and by extension the Rama government, Balluku, until the moment she returned to Tirana, worked as a domestic helper for a friendly family in Oktapoda and does not have any higher education degree.
Some attribute her rise to politics to her marriage to one of Albania's most prominent journalists, Sokol Balla (2004), with whom she had two children and is currently separated.
It is also noteworthy that she stubbornly refuses to make any reference to her grandfather, perhaps because he is also included in the list of criminals of the dictatorship, for decisions he had made before he was executed.
