From Rama's hands to the ministries, 16 institutions change their dependence

Two weeks ago, parliament approved three draft laws that provided for the legal manner of functioning of several state agencies, moving them from direct dependence on the Prime Minister and the Council of Ministers to dependence on line ministries.

In the reports accompanying the initiatives brought by the government, it was argued that the changes were related to a 2025 report by SIGMA, an EU and OECD program to support good governance, which criticized the centralization of power in the hands of the prime minister, causing problems in the functionality of the administration and its fragmentation.

"The organizational structure is highly centralized," the report noted, adding that several agencies under the Prime Minister cover areas of activity related to the responsibilities of existing ministries, thus limiting the possibility of effective ministerial direction and control.

For civil society experts, the model created by Rama has brought not only the concentration of power in 'one hand', but also institutional instability and a lack of accountability.

Even the Prime Minister's Office acknowledges that the reform in the administration aims to increase efficiency and coordination and strengthen institutional performance in the function of policymaking and the European integration process.

“SIGMA’s assessment focused on identifying the optimal balance between centralized coordination and strategic oversight, on the one hand, and effective delegation of sectoral functions and inter-ministerial cooperation, on the other, with the aim of strengthening public policy coherence, administrative efficiency and governance effectiveness,” the prime minister told BIRN.

According to the government, the reform will reduce the 29 state authorities that are subordinate to the prime minister to 13, and the rest will be subordinate to various ministries according to profiling.

Agencies with strategic, cross-sectoral functions, those expressly provided for in the Constitution, national security functions, as well as those of government priority areas, will continue to be subordinate to the Prime Minister's office, while sectoral, coordinating functions will be subordinate to the ministries according to their functions.

"At the conclusion of this assessment exercise, it was considered that 13 institutions should continue to remain subordinate to the Prime Minister, due to their role in exercising the functions listed above as functions belonging to the center of government," said the Prime Minister's Office, while listing the new organization for 16 other institutions.

The separation provides that; the Water Resources Management Agency will be subordinated to the minister responsible for the environment; the State Authority for Geospatial Information will be subordinated to the Ministry of Defense; the Central Inspectorate, the Technical Secretariat of the National Economic Council and Startup Albania will be subordinated to the Minister responsible for the economy; the Agency for Dialogue and Co-Governance, the Department of Public Administration, the Albanian School of Public Administration and the General Directorate for Anti-Corruption will be subordinated to the Minister for Public Administration and Anti-Corruption; the Agency for Civil Society Support will be subordinated to the Minister responsible for social welfare; the State Attorney's Office will be subordinated to the Minister of Justice; the General Directorate of Archives, the State Committee for Cults and the National Youth Agency will be subordinated to the Minister responsible for culture, tourism and sports and the Agency for Local Self-Government Support will be subordinated to the Minister for Local Government;

According to the Prime Minister's Office, the Albanian Telegraphic Agency is still in the evaluation process.

During his long reign, Prime Minister Edi Rama has created a model of centralizing power in his hands over various sectors, creating new 'satellite' agencies for specific areas of communication, coordination and institutional innovation, such as the Media and Information Agency (MIA) and the Center for Openness and Dialogue, COD, strengthening existing agencies and giving these structures functions that were previously distributed across ministries.

These agencies will continue to remain subordinate to the Prime Minister's office along with other important institutions: the Public Procurement Agency, the Territorial Development Agency, the Agency for the Coordination of Foreign Aid (SASPAC), the National Agency for the Information Society (AKSHI), the State Cadastre Agency (ASHK), the National Authority for the Security of Classified Information (AKSIK), the National Authority for Cyber ​​Security (AKSK), the State Intelligence Service (SHISH), the Academy of Sciences, etc. Reporter.al