Friday, March 6, 2009

Fatmir Limaj, Shpresa e Kombit te Ri!


Fatmir Limaj
/photo fisnik dobreci/

Rrugetimi i heroit te Kosoves nga kryengritesi ne ndertues rrugesh
Fatmir Limaj personifikon shpresen e kombit te ri

“Ndertimi i vendit ishte nje enderr e brezit tim. Tani, une jam duke e jetuar ate enderr, por ka shume per te bere. Njerezit tane jane punetore te palodhur, mirepo ata kane nevoje per nje menaxher te mire per kanalizimin e energjise se tyre”, shprehet Limaj

‘Christian Science Monitor’

Nuk ka shume vende ne Evrope kur nje minister i Transportit eshte nje hero kombetar, emri i te cilit kendohet ne kenge popullore. Por Kosova nuk eshte nje vend i zakonshem. Vendi, qe ka mbushur nje vit muajin e kaluar, eshte ku Fatmir Limaj eshte duke pasur sukses ne punen, ku te gjithe te tjeret ketu kane deshtuar: ne ndertimin e rrugeve. Z. Limaj ne shume menyra eshte nje histori e Kosoves. Me 1998, ai mori armen si nje udheheqes kryengrites, fitoi betejen e pare te vertete te Ushtrise Clirimtare te Kosoves kunder serbeve dhe u be i njohur si “Komandant Celiku.” Ai u arrestua dhe me pas u lirua ne Hage per krime lufte. Sot, ai mban kostume te erreta, kepuce lekure te lustruara dhe pret shirita dhe merret me beton te fresket dhe xhade te asfaltuara. Ne vitin 2007, kur u be minister i Transportit, Limaj vetem pese milje (8 kilometra) autostrade kater-korsi kane ekzistuar ne Kosove. Vitin e kaluar, ai ka ndertuar tete milje (13 kilometra), krijoi punishte 24-oreshe dhe tani eshte duke mbikeqyrur ndertimin e tete miljeve (13 kilometra) te tjera te rruges kater-korsi. Kosovaret e duan. Limaj e sheh Ministrine e Transportit pothuajse si ministri personale, nje thirrje per te ndertuar vendin. Ai e ka lexuar “The Audacity of Hope (“Guximi i Shpreses”) te Barack Obames, dhe duket se u ofron mesazhin “Po, mundemi” kosovareve cinike, te lodhur nga premtimet e paplotesuara dhe rruget me balte. Me kredenciale prej kryengritesi, ne shoqerine e shumices shqiptare, Limaj ka bashkuar kokat, ka gjetur konsensus me kontraktoret dhe ka mobilizuar fuqine punetore.

Ndertimi i rrugeve te dhive ne autostrada moderne

Nje drejtues i nje organizate perendimore joqeveritare, i cili ka jetuar ne Kosove per disa vjet, e pershkruan Limajn si “nje nga te miret…. Metodat e tij nuk jane tipike, mirepo ato jane praktike dhe me siguri se cfare i nevojiten Kosoves tani. ”Rruget ne kete shoqeri rurale kane qene aq te dobeta dhe kuturu, saqe udhetaret nga Evropa veriore kane humbur ne menyre rutinore, madje edhe ne vitet e fundit. Infrastrukture rrugore e shekullit 21 do te thote zhvillim. Megjithate, nje dekade pas nderhyrjes se NATO-s dhe pavaresisht buxhetit per rruget eshte bere pak. Rruget e fshatit kane mbetur primitive, pa asfaltim dhe nje makth ne dimer. Rruga kryesore nga aeroporti per ne Prishtine ishte dy-shiriteshe, e ngarkuar pa mase dhe me gropa. Megjithate, ne vitin e kaluar, Ministria e Limajt ka asfaltuar ose riasfaltuar rreth 500 kilometra rruge, duke miratuar nje strategji qe lidh fshatrat me njeri-tjetrin dhe me arteriet kryesore. “Kishte aq shume rruge, saqe ne te gjithe filluan te pyesim veten pse kjo nuk kishte ndodhur me pare,” thote Artan Mustafa, redaktor politik ne gazeten ‘Ekspres’. “Sigurisht, nje arsye eshte per shkak se Limaj ka fuqi. Askush nuk mund t’i thote Komandant Celikut se rruga nuk do te kaloje permes ketu apo atje. Ai ju tregon juve, ju nuk i tregoni atij.” Duke folur ne zyren e tij prane nderteses se re te parlamentit, Limaj shpjegon pasionin e tij per atdheun e tij. “E ndiej kete 24 ore ne dite. Ishte nje enderr e rinise sime, per te pasur nje vend te lire,” thote ai. “Ne qofte se keni pyetur mua 10 vjet me pare, une do te kisha thene se liria ishte e pamundur. Por Zoti na e ka dhene mundesine.”

Renia e murit, nje test durimi

Tregimi personal i Limajt filloi kur ai ishte nje udheheqes i studenteve ne fillim te viteve 1990. Muri i Berlinit kishte rene, por njeriu i forte serb Sllobodan Millosheviqi kishte revokuar statusin e posacem te Kosoves ne Jugosllavi. Shqiptaret, 90 per qind e popullsise, kane jetuar nje jete te klases se dyte nen represionin brutal policor-shteteror me punkte te kontrollit, vrasje arbitrare, tortura, me ringjalljen e ndjenjes se thelle te mitit nacional te serbeve per Kosoven si zemra shpirterore e tyre, dicka e ndaluar ne Jugosllavi nen udheheqjen e gjate te liderit mareshal Tito. “Pjesa tjeter e Evropes levizte ne menyra te paimagjinueshme per ne,” thote ai. “Fryma e Evropes Lindore ishte kudo. Populli ne Evrope merrte fryme me lehte. Por per ne po ndodhte e kunderta. Evropa ishte duke shkuar perpara, ndersa ne po leviznim prapa. Debat publik nuk u lejua ne Kosoven e re dhe studentet u rebeluar. Ne donim qe zerat tone te degjohen ne Jugosllavine federale,” kujton Limaj. “Ne donim te paralajmeronim qendren se sa i rrezikshem ishte programi i Millosheviqit per te ndaluar kete goditje.” Per nje dekade, Limaj dhe Kosova priten, ndersa udheheqesi politik dhe shpirteror i Kosoves, Ibrahim Rugova, u kundervihej taktikave serbe me nje strategji gandiane te durimit dhe jo dhunes. Nje pike e kthimit per kosovaret arriti me marreveshjen e paqes se Dejtonit te udhehequr nga SHBA per Bosnjen.

“Pas Dejtonit, te gjitha shpresat dhe endrrat tona u shuan,” thote Limaj. “Qe Millosheviqi do te mund te vriste per vite pa u ndeshkuar, e pastaj te paraqite veten si nje njeri i paqes ... kjo ishte krejtesisht deshperuese per ne. Nuk kishte asnje shprese. Ne pame ate cfare bente ketu. Eshte e vertete, ne qofte se nje person normal ka zgjedhje, ai kurre nuk do te zgjidhte luften. Mirepo, duhej ose te largohemi nga Kosova, ose te organizojne veten te rezistojme. “

Limaj u perball me drejtesine dhe fitoi respekt

Ish-komandanti minimizon statusin e heroit te UCK-se. Por Limaj ishte i pari qe te ndryshonte taktikat e UCK-se, qe karakterizoheshin me perleshje guerile neper fshatra dhe duke u fshehur neper male, duke konfrontuar forcat serbe hapur. Njesite e tij eventualisht ka mbajtur dy rruge kryesore dhe ka strehuar 85.000 persona, nje spital dhe nje radiostacion. Javen e kaluar, tribunali per krime te luftes ne Jugosllavi ne Hage mori verdiktin e tij te pare per luften ne Kosove. Kater gjenerale serbe u shpallen fajtore per perdorim sistematik te forces kunder civileve. Mirepo gjykata e liroi atehere presidentin jugosllav Milan Milutinoviq, duke cituar se Millosheviqi ishte pergjegjesi kryesor. “Ne praktike, ishte Millosheviqi, ndonjehere i quajtur si ‘Komandanti Suprem,’ i cili ushtroi autoritetin e komandantit ... gjate fushates se NATO-s,” ka deklaruar gjyqtari kryesor Iain Bonomi. Millosheviqi vdiq ne qeline e tij ne Hage ne vitin 2006, gjate mbrojtjes se tij ndaj akuzave per gjenocid ne Bosnje dhe Kosove. Koha e Limajt ne Hage mbetet e ndjeshme. Ai u arrestua per krime, per kohen qe ka sherbyer si komandant i UCK-se, ne rajonin e Llapushnik-ut. Ai mohoi fajesine, por ra dakord per t’u perballur me akuzat. “Aq sa nuk pajtohesha me akuzat, ndjeja se ishte pergjegjesi jona per t’iu pergjigjur,” thote Limaj. “Keshtu qe thashe se do te shkoj ne Hage, dhe isha i sigurt se drejtesia do te mbizoteroje.” Ajo ishte kohe e vetmuar, e merzitshme per Limajn. Kur ai u lirua ne vitin 2005, ai kritikoi ashper autoritetet e Kosoves per mungesen e mbeshtetjes logjistike ligjore qe ai mendonte se do te kishte shkurtuar gjykimin e tij. “Une nuk do te jem nje njeri qe i frikesohet drejtesise. Por ne nje situate te tille ju keni nje milion mendime qe kalojne neper mendjen tende”.

Mesimi nga “Guximi i shpreses”

Kur u kthye Limaj, mijera kosovare bene udhetime te gjata per ne shtepine e tij. Dy perpjekjet per te kandiduar per kryetar komune te Prishtines deshtuan. Por kryeministri Hashim Thaci ia dha atij Ministrine e Transportit, e cila i pelqen. “Cfare Limaj mesoi nga “Guximi i shpreses” i Obames ishte organizimi i ri i presidentit te komunitetit ne Cikago. “Ai shkoi shtepi me shtepi per te kuptuar njerezit, endrrat dhe shpresat e tyre, keshtu qe deri ne kohen qe ai kandidoi per president ai mund te fliste me te gjithe. Kjo do te jete nje detyre ne Kosove, ende i ndare ne mes te shqiptareve dhe serbeve. Synimet e Kosoves jane humane ... ne nuk duam te lendojme apo demtojme te tjeret ... por t’ia mundesojme cdonjerit te jetoje se bashku ne nje shtet te ri”. Provimi me i madh per Limajn mund te jete perpara. Pasi ka fituar zemrat si nje njeri qe e kryen punen dhe emri i te cilit eshte futur ne kenget heroike popullore shekullore shqiptare, ai tani duhet te perfundoje rrugen e aeroportit, rrugen e re per ne Shkup dhe te drejtoje veshtiresite e ndertimit. “Ai e fitoi betejen e pare, por tani eshte test i vertete,” thote nje zyrtar i KB-se. Redaktori Mustafa shton: “Te gjithe e duan Limajn, mirepo edhe une pres ate dite kur nje nepunes civil i zakonshem do te mund te jape nje urdher dhe ai te zbatohet.” /kosova sot/06.03.09/

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VERZIONI ANGLISHT

Paving the way: A Kosovo hero's path from rebel to road-builder
by Robert Marquand, The Christian Science Monitor

Fatmir Limaj

PRISTINA, KOSOVO - There aren't many places in Europe where a minister of transport is a national hero whose name is sung in folk songs.

But Kosovo is not an ordinary place. The country, a year old last month, is where Fatmir Limaj is succeeding at a job everyone else here has failed at: building roads.

Mr. Limaj is in many ways a Kosovo story. In 1998, he took up the gun as a rebel leader, won the first real Kosovo Liberation Army battle against Serbs, and became known as "Commander Steel." He was arrested and later acquitted at The Hague for war crimes. Today, he wears dark suits and patent leather shoes, and cuts ribbons – and deals – over fresh concrete and macadam.

In 2007, when Limaj became transport minister, only five miles of four-lane highway existed in Kosovo. Last year, he built eight miles, instituted 24-hour work sites, and is now overseeing the construction of eight additional miles of four-lane roadway.

Kosovars love it. Limaj views the transport ministry almost as a personal ministry, a calling to build a country. He's read Barack Obama's "The Audacity of Hope," and seems to offer a "Yes, we can" message to cynical Kosovars weary of unmet promises and muddy roads. With rebel credentials in the majority-Albanian society, Limaj has knocked heads, found consensus with contractors, and mobilized a workforce. He regularly drops in on sites at midnight or later. Last year, a TV crew filmed him directing work at 3 a.m., showing the country that change was indeed under way.

"I'm restless by nature, just ask my wife," he says. "Building a country was a dream of my generation. Now, I'm living that dream, but there's a lot to do.

"Our people are hard workers, but they need a good manager to channel their energy."

Upgrading donkey paths to modern highways

An executive from a Western nongovernmental organization, who has lived in Kosovo for several years, describes Limaj as "one of the good ones.... His methods aren't typical, but they are practical, and probably what Kosovo needs right now."

Roads in this agricultural society have been so haphazard and poor that travelers from northern Europe routinely got lost, even in recent years. A 21st-century road infrastructure means development. Yet a decade after NATO intervened, and despite a highway budget, little was done. Village roads remained primitive, unpaved, and a nightmare in winter. The main "highway" from the airport to Pristina was two-laned, donkey-laden, and potholed.

Yet last year, Limaj's ministry paved or repaved nearly 500 miles of highway – adopting a strategy of connecting villages with one another and with key arteries.

"It was so much road that we all started to wonder why it hadn't happened before," says Artan Mustafa, political editor at the Express newspaper. "Obviously, one reason is because Limaj has power. No one can say to [Commander Steel] that the road won't go through here or there. He tells you, you don't tell him."

Speaking in his office near the new parliament building, Limaj explains his passion for his homeland. "I feel that 24 hours a day. It was a dream of my youth, to have a free country," he says. "If you asked me 10 years ago, I would have said that freedom was impossible. But God gave us the opportunity."

Fall of Wall a test of patience

Limaj's own story began when he was a student leader in the early 1990s. The Berlin Wall had fallen, but Serbian strongman Slobodan Milosevic had revoked Kosovo's special status in Yugoslavia. The Albanian, 90 percent of the population, lived a second-class existence under brutal police-state repression – checkpoints, arbitrary killing, torture – as Serbs revived a deeply felt national myth of Kosovo as their spiritual heartland, something disallowed under Yugoslavia's longtime leader, Marshal Tito.

"The rest of Europe was moving in ways unimaginable to us," he says. "The spirit of East Europe was everywhere. People in Europe were breathing easier. But for us, the opposite was happening. Europe was moving forward, and we were moving backward."

Public debate wasn't allowed in the new Kosovo and students rebelled. "We wanted our voices heard in federal Yugoslavia," Limaj recalls. "We wanted to warn the center how dangerous the program of Milosevic was, to stop this crackdown."

For a decade, Limaj and Kosovo waited as the political and spiritual leader of Kosovo, Ibrahim Rugova, reacted to Serbian tactics with a Gandhian strategy of patience and nonviolence.

A tipping point for Kosovars arrived with the US-led Dayton peace deal on Bosnia.

"After Dayton, all our hopes and dreams fell," Limaj says. "That Milosevic could kill with impunity for years, then present himself as a man of peace ... this was totally depressing for us. There was no hope. We saw what he was doing here. It's true, if a normal person has choices, he would never choose war. But it was either leave Kosovo, or organize ourselves to resist."

Limaj faced justice and earned respect

The former commander plays down his KLA hero status. But Limaj was the first to switch KLA tactics – characterized by guerrilla skirmishes in villages and hiding in the hills – by confronting Serb forces in the open. His units eventually held two main highways and sheltered 85,000 people, a hospital, and a radio station.

Last week, the Yugoslav war crimes tribunal at The Hague offered its first verdict on the Kosovo war. Four Serb generals were found guilty of using systematic force against civilians. But the tribunal acquitted then Yugoslav President Milan Milutinovic, citing Milosevic as mainly responsible: "In practice, it was Milosevic, sometimes termed the 'Supreme Commander,' who exercised actual command authority … during the NATO campaign," stated chief judge Iain Bonomy.

Milosevic died in his cell at The Hague in 2006, during his defense against genocide charges in Bosnia and Kosovo.

Limaj's time at The Hague remains a sensitive one. He was arrested for crimes while serving as KLA commander of the Llapushnik region. He denied guilt, but agreed to face charges. "As much as I didn't agree with the accusation, I felt it was our responsibility to respond," Limaj says. "So I said I would go to The Hague, and was sure justice would prevail."

It was a lonely, worrisome time for Limaj. When he was released in 2005, he bitterly criticized Kosovo authorities for a lack of logistical legal support that he felt would have shortened his trial. "I was not going to be a man afraid of justice. But in a situation like that, you have a million thoughts running through your mind."

When Limaj returned, thousands of Kosovars made a pilgrimage to his home. Two attempts to run for mayor of Pristina failed. But Prime Minister Hashim Thachi gave him the transport ministry, which he relishes.

What Limaj took from Obama's "Audacity of Hope" was the new president's community organizing in Chicago. "He went house to house to understand the people, their hopes and dreams, so by the time he ran for president could speak to everybody."

That will be a task in Kosovo, still divided between Albanian and Serb. "Kosovo's intentions are humane… we don't want to harm or do damage to others… but allow everyone live together in a new state."

Limaj's biggest test may be ahead. Having won hearts as a man who gets things done, and whose name has been added to a centuries-old Albanian heroic folk song – he must now finish the airport road, as well as a new road to Skopje, and navigate construction difficulties. "He's won the initial battle, but now is the real test," says a UN official.

Mr. Mustafa, the editor, adds that "Everybody loves Limaj, but I also long for the day when an ordinary civil servant can give an order, and it is followed."
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