Early April BMI Research, a private company that produces predictions on macroeconomic development or different economic sectors, published a report with predictions about Albania. The report costs $1245 and can be acquired here.
This report is just one of the dozens of reports that different companies around the world draft as commercial products for clients, mainly companies interested in investing in expanding to different countries or industries.
The BMI Report for Albania gives a generally positive macroeconomic outlook for the country, or, more precisely, it foresees the continuation of the current economic situation for the next 2–3 years.
Even though such a market report is essentially irrelevant for any political or policy consideration, Prime Minister has used it for propaganda purposes, especially to attack the opposition, departing from several opinions of the authors of the report regarding the expected economic developments.
Under the now famous title “Who’s lying?,” Rama published a Facebook status in which he boasts about the report. But in fact all his references to the report turn out to be incorrect or fake citations with which he misinforms and lies to the public.
First of all, the Prime Minister refers to the report’s authors as Fitch Ratings, rather than BMI Research. Whereas Fitch is one of the main ratings agencies in the world, together with Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s, it also owns BMI Research, which it bought two years ago. However, BMI reports are not the same as the official Fitch ratings and have nothing to do with them.
By claiming the Fitch wrote the report, Prime Minister Rama has tried to improve the credentials of his misinformation while hiding the commercial and irrelevant nature of the report.
But Prime Minister Rama doesn’t stop there. His citations from the report add words, change sentences, and basically give his own interpretation of BMI Research’s findings that have no relation with the original text.
A first example, the original in English:
Albania has made progress at addressing political challenges over the last two years, but the real test will come when the nation goes to the polls on June 18. We believe that the ruling Socialist coalition will hold on to power, implying a high degree of policy continuity.
Rama’s translation (alterations in bold):
Albania has made progress at addressing the risks that come from political instability, but the real test will come when the nation goes to the poll on June 18. There is a large chance that the Socialist government will hold on to power, which will give the country political stability.
As has been emphasized, the Prime Minister replaced “Socialist coalition” with “Socialist government,” perhaps with the intention to suggest that he will give political stability whether with the LSI or without.
Also, instead of transmitting the opinion of the authors that “the ruling Socialist coalition will hold on to power,” the Prime Minister has removed the “we believe” and replaced it for no good reason with “there is a large chance.” Note here that the chance is “large,” and not merely a simple chance. That certainly wouldn’t be enough.
More importantly, instead of reproducing the authors’ opinion that a continuation of the ruling coalition after the elections would imply a continuation of policy (a logical idea), the Prime Minister has translation the term “policy” into “political,” thus misinterpreting the report as if a socialist victory during the elections would give “political stability” rather than “policy continuity.”
But the most important distortion of the Prime Minister is his false claim that a victory for the opposition would pose a problem to the economical welfare of the country. According to the report:
While EU accession criteria will remain an important policy anchor regardless of who wins the next June elections, the risks of regression are arguably larger if the opposition wins power.
This was translated by Prime Minister Rama as follows:
The risk of economic regression would be much larger if the opposition wins power.
It is clear that whereas the report speaks about the expected policies as regards EU integration and the risk for a regression of such policies, the Prime Minister interprets them as if a victory of the opposition would imply economic regression.
The economy is after all not only the largest failure of the Prime Minister, but also the main worry of the people. So in absence of any real arguments for the increase in national welfare, the Prime Minister chooses to abuses others to seem credible.
And now that we are speaking about economic growth, in his comment the Prime Minister “forgot” to present the most important finding of the report. BMI Research declares that economic growth in 2016 was 3.1%, while in 2017 it forecasts a growth of 3.3%.
Meanwhile, the government pretends that economic growth in 2016 has been 3.3–3.5% (the government has made different statements about the actual number) and claims that in 2017 it will be 3.5–4%, depending on the mood of the government.
In any case, we have again to emphasize that this report has no importance whatsoever and is a commercial product. However, our desperate Prime Minister’s abuse of this report, a gesture which has become routine, deserves to be pointed out.
