Former minister of Justice Ylli Manjani has condemned Albanian Premier Edi Rama’s proposal for the punishment of media portals that publish fake news.

"The monster of the free speech has shown his head”, Manjani writes. “He proposes the libel to be punished by the government, not by the court. ‘There isn’t why we should bother to go to the court’, he says. He proposes high penalties for those who libel and publish fake news. It’s OK for the penalty, but the question is how will the libels or fake news be proved? It’s up to an independent court of law to define whether a public statement is a libel, through a regular court process where proof and facts will be scrutinized”.

“The Prime Minister says there’s no need to go to the court and let the government punish the offenders. That would mean that the party’s anti-libel department orders the public agency X to fine any journalist, news portal or citizen for libel! This is an execution without a court process of anyone that express their thoughts. Following this logic, there’s no need for the court to punish the other offences as well, but the party and its commissaries in the police”.

“We wouldn’t need the elections either, because we have the polls. This is exactly a state-party! The democracy is being proclaimed an alien vice”.