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The results of the September-November 2023 Census have been published amid controversy by the director of INSTAT, Elsa Dhuli, who to make them public did not organize a conference with journalists, but an activity where she had invited ministers, ambassadors, representatives of minorities, etc.
According to these results, 2 million 402 thousand 113 inhabitants live in Albania. A good part of the population, more than 32%, lives in Tirana, or about 758 thousand inhabitants.
The second largest district in terms of population is Fieri with 240 thousand inhabitants, then comes Elbasan with about 232 thousand inhabitants, Durrës with 225 thousand inhabitants, Korça with 173 thousand etc.
The debate on the manipulation of figures
The number of inhabitants in Albania has always been the subject of political debate. The opposition claims that since the Socialist Party took power in 2013, 1 million inhabitants or more have left Albania.
The head of the Democratic Party, Sali Berisha, claims that the figures have been manipulated and that in reality there are about 1 million and 500 thousand inhabitants left in Albania. The day before, Berisha came out with a status where he expressed his opinion that the Census figures have been manipulated.
"Tomorrow Edi Rama, the "Cubrilovic of the Albanians" publishes the population census data after having manipulated them from beginning to end. After adding hundreds and thousands of citizens who are no longer in Albania this year, nor for years," said Berisha.
Suspicions of the manipulation of the Census results were reinforced due to the delay in the publication of the result. Interviewing the population started in September and was supposed to last only 6 weeks. But after the process was closed, it was said that the results would be published on June 19. Later, the director of Instat further postponed the announcement of the results until June 28. These are only the first results, as INSTAT will publish in October a platform with all the detailed data at the municipality level.
Thus, the delay is extended for almost a year, without an inherent reason.
Doubts increased after the results of the Census in Kosovo were published about a month after the process was completed.
Almost 500 thousand Albanians left abroad
Beyond the political debate, the INSTAT figures do not hide the massive departure of Albanians in the last 13 years.
Compared to 2011, half a million Albanians left our country to live abroad. From the difference in the figures of INSTAT, it can be seen that the citizens left abroad are 419 thousand 831 inhabitants.
But the figure goes up to 500,000 inhabitants if the natural increase that the population should have had in these years, of 88,000 inhabitants, is also added here.
In all these years, there has been a lot of talk about depopulation and the reasons why Albanians leave the country, sometimes as asylum seekers in France or Belgium or sometimes as refugees in Great Britain. The tendency to emigrate to Albania is high and unemployment, corruption and poverty remain among the main reasons./Lapsi.al
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