Albania Delays Education Vote Until Student Holiday

Students protest against the higher education bill in Tirana | Photo by : Luciano Golemi

Albanian MPs will get to vote on a controversial higher education law on July 2 – conveniently after universities have closed for the summer vacation and the students have gone home.

Because parliament has not met in the last two weeks due to the local elections held last Sunday, the vote might even be pushed back further into July, as the education commission has not yet approved the legislation. 

The vote comes follows months of protests against the bill organized by For the University Movement, a left-wing grassroots group, which has managed to put off a vote on the reform for months.

Police briefly detained seven activists at their last rally on June 10 accusing them of organizing an illegal rally.  

The movement started last year. The protests are against repeated rises in tuition fees and the government’s move to prepare a legal basis for the provision of funds for private universities.

The movement maintains that the new law on higher education erodes academic freedom by putting universities under the control of the government, while diverting public funds to private universities and increasing fees for students.

The government says the tuition fees in public universities need to go up in order to increase the cash available to higher education.

The government also denies aiming to interfere in university administration, claiming that the new law will offer equal treatment for all universities whatever their ownership model.

The private higher education sector has boomed in Albania over the last decade but has shown signs of crisis in the last few years, with enrolment levels at private colleges falling.