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President of the Constitutional Court of the Republic or Knight of the Order of the Kingdom?

President of the Constitutional Court of the Republic or Knight of the Order of

By Auron Tare

By chance today in the press, I saw a statement by the President of the Constitutional Court of the Republic, Ms. Holta Zace, on her concerns about her tenure at work. Without claiming to know the issue, I read it in passing, but what impressed me was the photograph accompanying her press statement. The President of the Court was decorated with the “Order of Skanderbeg,” a medal created by the President of the Albanian Republic, Ahmet Zogu, and later the First King, Zog. (photo 1)

The “Order of Skanderbeg,” which Zog awarded for special merits in four degrees: “High Order,” “Senior Officer,” “Commander,” and “Member,” continued its life until 1940, when, with the unification of Albania with Fascist Italy, the Italians reformed the now-departed King’s system of decorations, removing it from the list of official insignia.

The “Order of Skanderbeg,” or as it was known at the time, the “Commander of Skanderbeg,” fell out of use after World War II, when Enver Hoxha’s government created or adopted a series of medals inspired by the Communist East. The “Order of Skanderbeg” remained an interesting relic for collectors of the monarchist period.

Knowing more or less this story, I was surprised how the President of the Court of the Republic could have been decorated with a royal medal, an order that is moreover no longer recognized and used.

To solve this strange question, I turned to some collectors who are well acquainted with historical moles. Laughing, they told me that there was no mystery in this matter. The President of the Constitutional Court, looking for a mole for her institution, had fallen for it for a while.

Surely, while surfing the internet, he had found Zog’s decoration and decided to use it for the badge of the Constitutional Court of the Republic. And, to make this farce even more comical, they also sent me a photo where the entire Body of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Albania had the “Order of Skanderbeg” decreed by King Ahmet Bey Zog the First sewn on their chests. (The only difference was that they had removed the star and replaced it with Skanderbeg’s helmet.)

And, to add even more comedy to our beloved country, I learned that this Royal Order is only used today by the heirs of King Zog's family to decorate some of their loved ones.

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