Albania’s prime minister wants to appoint an AI to his ministry
- Reference: 1757654107
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/09/12/albania_ai_minister/
- Source link:
Speaking at his socialist party’s annual conference yesterday, prime minister Edi Rama [1]named his planned cabinet, and suggested the nation’s government services chatbot “Djella” for a promotion to the ministry.
According to a [2]session description for the 2025 European Political Community Summit, which Albania hosted in May 2025, Djella started life in 2024 as a virtual assistant that Albanian citizens could use to answer questions about government services. Version 2.0, launched in early 2025, was “an intelligent avatar integrating natural language understanding with vocal and visual interaction, providing real-time information for public services and online applications on e-Albania.”
[3]
By the time of the conference, Djella 3.0 was up and running and offered “full interaction through voice commands, allowing citizens to complete service requests using simple, conversational language — marking a major step forward in digital government accessibility.”
[4]
[5]
Local news reports [6]suggest Djella runs on Microsoft’s Azure OpenAI service, plus “the latest artificial intelligence models” from the software giant.
In his speech, Rama said he expects his new ministers to increase the pace of innovation, likening their role to that of a basketball coach who makes constant personnel and tactical shifts, rather than a football coach who makes just three substitutions in each match.
[7]
The PM wants Djella to “become the servant of public procurements”, all of which he wants conducted by AI, “making Albania a country where public tenders are 100 percent incorruptible and where every public fund that goes through the tender procedure is 100 percent legible.”
“This is not science fiction, but it is one of Djella's duties,” Rama added. “Djella's mandate will have neither geographical nor nationality limits, and the structure supporting it will have the authorization to hire here, or contract talents from all over the world.”
Albania’s constitution makes several mentions of “legal persons” and includes “a pledge to protect human dignity and personhood.” It also requires the PM to seek approval for ministerial appointments from the nation’s president, and for incoming ministers to swear before the president.
[8]
His excellency Bajram Begaj, for it is he who holds the office of president, will therefore have the final word on whether Djella can become a minister. ®
Get our [9]Tech Resources
[1] https://ps.al/newsroom/mbahet-asambleja-kombetare-e-ps-kryetari-rama-prezanton-ekipin-e-katert-qeverises/
[2] https://epctiranasummit.al/digital-revolution
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aMPvN3e0vgfYniR_C-HGbwAAAAY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aMPvN3e0vgfYniR_C-HGbwAAAAY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aMPvN3e0vgfYniR_C-HGbwAAAAY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://a2news.com/shqiperia/aktualitet/Djella-rama-prezanton-asistenten-e-re-virtuale-me-ze-dhe-fi-i1138185
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aMPvN3e0vgfYniR_C-HGbwAAAAY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/publicsector&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aMPvN3e0vgfYniR_C-HGbwAAAAY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[9] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Great idea !
Most likely, but don't forget that "public procurement" is usually associated with incompetence and poor value and, especially in that part of the world, outright corruption. With suitable guardrails and some oversight who knows whether AI will make a bigger hash than the meatsacks?
I'm glad somebody is looking to undertake the experiment, I'm even more glad I'm not the taxpayer on the hook for this.
"incorruptible"
Because software is well know for not having back doors written by humans
Re: "incorruptible"
Who needs backdoors to corrupt an LLM's responses?
Marketing claims, uncritical "reviews" in trade organs, over-inflated CVs - all taken in and regurgitated without the weary human bullshit detector.
Hallucination AND Foreign Interference, what fun!
LLMs hallucinate because they are autocomplete algorithms on steroids. They have no grounding and no base model. They are better when they have material to work with (e.g. RAG, Summarization) but in my professional experience, even then they are not perfect and you need to fact check them.
Couple that with the fact that OpenAI and Microsoft are American corporations with CEOs who have high-profile links to DJT and MAGA and you can see how this idea is about as ridiculous (and reliable) as saying "We're just going to make Trump one of our ministers"... actually to be fair, he's probably one of the few people LLMs do outperform.
Re: Hallucination AND Foreign Interference, what fun!
We know this. The arts'n'farts graduates, narcissists and halfwits that make up 99% of the political classes do not.
Around the world governments are all suffering a mass hysteria, based on zero knowledge combined with utterly unrealistic expectations of the potential. Most politicians in most countries hate their civil servants, whom they think slow, obstructive, incompetent, untrustworthy. Most politicians are also lazy, and outsource their thinking to hand-picked "special advisors" with whom they often fall out (Trump/Musk, Johnson/Cummins, etc). For the political classes, they think that they will be able to replace civil servants and even their special advisors* with AI, and then they'll save a load of money and have a totally loyal, incredibly astute system that solves all the thorny problems, does away with the endless errors of government.
Look at the rush of almost every government to push the adoption of AI - Starmer, Trump, Macron, Ishiba, Xi, etc etc. Even in financial markets there's talk of the AI bubble, but that's not stopping the politicians.
* Except the ones recruited purely on looks.
Feels like the PM may have gotten caught up in the hype train a little too much.
"Snapcase was reliable," said Mr Sock gloomily. "Remember when he made his horse a city councillor?"
"You've got to admit it wasn't a bad councillor. Compared to some of the others."
"As I recall, the others at that time were a vase of flowers, a heap of sand and three people who had been beheaded."
- Feet of Clay, p.223. Pratchett. T.
GNU Terry Pratchett
Re: Feels like the PM may have gotten caught up in the hype train a little too much.
The East German "Parliament" had a number of MPs who were elected with the mandatory 99%+ vote share even though they had been (and presumably still were) dead for a number of years.
Still, at least the Politburo weren't going to let that pesky wall in Berlin fall...
The stamp of firm leadership
Where's Enver Hoxha when you need him?
Alexa. Order me some popcorn
Ok. Playing "Popcorn" by Hot Butter.
Great idea !
Demonstrate publicly just how hard that fails.