Lamallari Out; Demo Takes Interior as Rama Folds Local Government Into Ministry

The Newsroom

Prime Minister Edi Rama announced Besfort Lamallari’s removal as Minister of the Interior on Friday and named Ervin Demo to take over the portfolio, with Demo’s local-government responsibilities to be absorbed into the Interior Ministry. Lamallari is set to leave the cabinet without a new ministerial post.

The announcement came exactly one year after Rama first named Lamallari to his fourth-term cabinet. Rama presented him as his intended Minister of Justice at the Socialist Party assembly on 11 September 2025; the cabinet was decreed by President Begaj four days later. In the reshuffle of 26 February 2026, when roughly half the cabinet was replaced, Lamallari was moved to the Interior Ministry, where he had previously served for several years as deputy minister.

Rama gave no reason for the removal. “Today I have decided to make a move in the team on the pitch,” he said. “Lamallari moves from running the Interior Ministry to my bench, together with me and the team here at the Prime Minister’s Office.” Lamallari will remain part of Rama’s staff at the Kryeministria in a role that was not specified.

Demo, until now Minister of State for Local Government, takes over Interior and keeps responsibility for local affairs, which will be integrated into the ministry. Rama described the merger as a return to an earlier arrangement: local government had historically sat within Interior, he said, and after “taking a considerably fuller shape as a separate portfolio” it would now be brought back into the Interior structure.

Demo said he would continue the work Lamallari had begun and keep cooperating with him in his new role at the Prime Minister’s Office. He added that the ministry’s relationship with communities, including under the government’s Besa programme, would be a focus of his tenure.

Lamallari, speaking after the announcement, thanked the prime minister “for the trust over these ten years” and said his return to the ministry where he had begun his career had been “an experience and a great privilege”. He said he had tried not to disappoint Rama and that it was “a pleasure and an honour” to remain at his side.

The reshuffle coincided with the swearing-in of Klodiana Spahiu as Minister of Health. Spahiu took the oath before President Bajram Begaj on Friday morning after Parliament approved her nomination with 79 votes. She replaces Evis Sala, who resigned on 2 September citing academic projects. Spahiu attended her first cabinet meeting immediately after the ceremony.

Friday’s move is the second broader reshuffle of Rama’s fourth term, after the February overhaul. It comes nine days after Evis Sala resigned from Health, triggering Spahiu’s appointment.