From Ali Buzra
Part Thirty-One
– A LIFE UNDER PRESSURE AND SUFFERING –
(ASSESSMENTS, COMMENTS, NARRATIVES)
Memorie.al / At the request and wish of the author, Ali Buzra, as his first editor and reader, I will briefly share with you what I experienced in this encounter with this book, which is his second (after the book “Gizaveshi through the years”) and which naturally continues his writing style. The sincerity and frankness of the narrative, the simple and unmodified language, the accuracy and precision of the episodes, or the lack of a refining, intentionally subsequent imagination, or its non-utilization, I believe have served the author positively, who comes to the reader in his original form, inviting us to at least get to know unknown human fates and pains, whether by chance or not, leaving us to reflect as a starting point for awareness towards a catharsis so necessary for the consciousness of Albanians.
Bedri Kaza
Continued from the previous issue
REXHEP KASA IS KILLED FIGHTING AS A DETERMINED ANTI-COMMUNIST
Victims of the newly established communist regime in the country were not only noble persons and families with wealthy heritage, but also simple and poor families, whose members openly opposed it. Such is the case of the Kasa family. Rexhep’s father, Isuf Kasa, from the village of Polis Gurshpatë, thanks to his abilities and thirst for study, with the interest of the Turkish authorities of the time, was sent to Istanbul for studies. There, he studied for several years, receiving religious education, where he also obtained the decree for Imam. However, being economically weak, he mainly engaged in agricultural and livestock work to support his family, thus remaining simply a preacher and devout believer in the village. Isuf’s first wife died, with whom he had only one daughter. He married for the second time, after he had passed his fifties. With his second wife, he had 6 children, 4 sons and 2 daughters.
In 1942, he passed away at the age of 91. During the war period, like most men of the village of Gurshpatë, his sons positioned themselves with the Balli Kombëtar, being members of the nationalist band led by Ali Cekani. After the liberation of the country, they threw themselves into agricultural work, also keeping some livestock, to meet the family’s needs.
The third son, Rexhepi, in 1947, was mobilized as a soldier and was serving in Delvinë. There, he came into contact with a group of comrades with anti-communist convictions, who had decided to escape to Greece. He cooperated with them and together they found the moment to escape. From Greece, he went to Italy. There, he made contact with Alush Lleshanaku, a determined anti-communist, from Bradashesh in Elbasan.
For some time, they underwent training for airborne landing, where Rexhepi stood out for his high physical fitness, ability, and skill in using the weaponry of the time. Rexhep Kasa, now, like many other escapees, became convinced that a brutal dictatorial regime was being established in Albania. In these circumstances, he resolutely became part of the activities of Alush Lleshanaku’s group, aimed at overthrowing the newly established communist regime in Albania.
Rexhepi received tasks and parachuted several times into the mountains of Polis and other areas of the country. Also operating within their group was a spy, connected to the Albanian State Security (Sigurimi), who from time to time informed the latter about their activities and the participating individuals. In March 1951, Rexhepi was in the village of Godolesh, sheltered in a family home. Numerous military pursuit forces surrounded the house and called on him to surrender, but he refused.
After several hours of exchange of fire between Rexhepi and the encircling forces, the latter set the house on fire. Through the smoke and flames, he came out of the house, and fighting bravely against the numerous military forces, Rexhepi was killed. Going back in time five years earlier, when Rexhepi escaped, their house and family were under surveillance day and night, but initially, they were not interned, apparently to enable his capture through close relatives, but this was not realized.
In May 1949, police forces surrounded the house of Ismail Kasa, who was the eldest brother and head of the family. They forcibly removed seven family members from the house: Ismail with his wife and three minor children; Faik, 8 years old, Daut, 4 years old, and Qamil, 2 years old. Along with them were also taken Ismail’s two brothers, Saliu and Shabani, aged 32 and 22 respectively, both unmarried. Their family was dispatched at the same time as the families of Sherif Muzhaqi from Vilan, Muharrem Zogolli from Bërzeshtë, Beqir, Ibrahim, and Islam Dobra from Letmi, etc.
Regarding this, Faiku, a survivor, today a living witness to the event, recounts that they stayed in Librazhd for two weeks in a barracks, lying on the few rags they could take from home. Then, they were sent on trucks, stopping in Turan. They were placed outside in the open sky, as there was no room inside. There, with a little dry cornbread, given in rations, they endured the rain, wind, and scorching sun until autumn. In November, they were all moved and sent to Tepelenë.
Along the way, they had to cross the Bënçë River. There, while the mother was holding the little son Qamil in her arms, and the father had taken out the 4-5-year-old son, Dautin, to return to get Faikun, the latter entered (the water), but fell and the river swept him away. The parents did not notice. During their departure for Tepelenë, there was no order or care whatsoever. The two uncles had been sent ahead and were not there in the tragic moments for 8-year-old Faiku, who was facing the river’s waves.
Fate willed that he survive, so that he too could testify today, like many others, to the ordeal and sufferings of the macabre camp of Tepelenë. The memories of fellow sufferers about Tepelenë have been described above, but the Kasa family experienced two tragic events. Saliu, the second brother, was part of the squad that dug graves every day for the numerous dead.
As if by an irony of fate, one day, after digging the last grave, exhausted and drained to the marrow, he lie down on the grave and fell asleep. After they finished work, his comrades were looking for him and found him lying in the grave. They called him, and one of them reached out his hand, as Saliu wasn’t getting up. After waking up, laughing, he told them that there in the grave, he had had a sweet sleep, seeing beautiful dreams.
Besides the work of digging graves, Saliu was also assigned the duty as the person responsible for distributing food to the internees, but he had nothing in hand, except maintaining order, as everything was planned and under the supervision of armed guards. Precisely on this day, after returning from work, he was standing near the food cauldron, in his assigned duty, while an armed policeman was next to him.
At that moment, the gun went off, and the bullet hit Gani Muzhaqi from Vilan in the hand, while it hit Saliu in the body, leaving him dead on the spot. Witnesses to the event say it was accidental, as a child had pulled the trigger of the policeman’s gun, but the fact is that Sali Kasa was killed and was buried in the grave he himself had dug.
Another shocking moment for them was that little Qamili, who had not yet turned three, fell ill. Lying on the planks where the family members were placed, on the thin rags spread under their ribs, the sick infant, without any medical help, would occasionally open his eyes looking at his mother, seeming to ask her for help. But what could the poor mother do, who, besides her bread ration, what else could she give him? Her breast had dried up long ago.
He could no longer swallow bread or the watery soup. For a few days, he remained like that, listless. Family members took turns passing by him, calling for him to react, and finally, the innocent child closed his eyes forever, a child who suffered the punishment for being a member of a family “enemy” to the regime. The cemeteries grew every day.
His mother placed a marker there, to at least distinguish her son’s grave. When she left the camp, until she passed beyond sight, her eyes lingered behind, her heart grieving. Thus, the Kasa family, out of 7 people, left two dead there, for whom they never had the chance to see or visit their graves. They stayed in Tepelenë until 1953, when the gradual release of internees began. Faiku and his mother were released earlier. At the beginning of 1951, Ismail was also temporarily released, with the aim of capturing Rexhepi.
One of the sisters, Shahja, had married into the Rrumbullaku family in Mirakë, while the other, Fatimeja, into the Qytyku family. The latter maintained contact with her brother Rexhepin, whom she met secretly and helped, supplying him with food. When Ismail was “released,” Rexhepi was sheltered in a forest near the village.
So, apparently, the State Security had information that Rexhepi had parachuted in, and therefore they released his brother. Fatimeja goes to Ismaili and tells him that Rexhepi would come at night to meet him. But Ismaili had noticed that the house was being secretly watched night and day, so he told her that if Rexhepi came, they would both be killed, so she should be careful.
On one occasion, the sister, thinking about the fact that her brother hadn’t committed crimes, told Rexhepi that it would be better to surrender. “Never!” he replied, telling his sister that the communists would not only not forgive him, but would torture him to reveal the bases where the escapees were sheltered. Rexhepi chose the path of resistance.
At a young age, only 28 years old, he was killed like a man and with honor, remaining faithful to his anti-communist ideal and to the families who had sheltered him and his comrades. After being released from internment, the family members returned to the village. For ten years, they were not given their land titles from the front (land reform). Later, they were provided with them, but stripped of the “kulak” (rich peasant) title.
However, the problem was the marriage of Shabani, who was getting older. They looked for a bride in various villages, but everywhere they hesitated because their family was considered politically compromised. After 7-8 years, it became possible for him to marry Hava Allmeta from Polis-Gostima, who was the daughter of a family that had been labeled as “kulaks”.
Shabani and his wife worked all the time in the agricultural cooperative. They gave birth to and raised five children; Qamil, Selim, Nadire, Fatmir, and Afërdita. When Shabani’s first child was born, Mother Meremja named him Qamil, in memory of her son left behind in Tepelenë.
There were also attempts to recruit the Kasa family and put them in the service of the Sigurimi. Thus, on one occasion, they summoned Ismail Kasa to the Directorate of Internal Affairs in Librazhd. There, they proposed that he work in Vilan, with the Muzhaq family, and provide information about them from time to time.
After a heated and threatening debate with the Head of the Internal Affairs Directorate, Ismail finally cut him short: – “Mister! I only know how to do masonry (build walls), not these jobs you’re asking me to do.” So he worked and lived with honor, this simple and dignified man, Ismail Kasa, until he passed away in 1991.
After 1975, the Kasa family did not face any particular persecution or mistreatment. They worked and lived in the cooperative with their fellow villagers, and also participated in and attended weddings and sorrows, without being mistreated or differentiated as happened with “kulak” families. Dauti married a girl from the Bufi clan in Gostimë.
The eldest son, Faiku, in 1965, was mobilized as a soldier but was deemed a ‘backward’ (politically unreliable). Every year they would call him, but after reviewing his documents, they wouldn’t conscript him into armed service because he could only be sent to a labor unit. He was finally sent to such a labor unit in Rinas. He was very careful and orderly in implementing military discipline, while showing not only correctness but also special skills during work. Noticing these qualities, the superior officer assigned him as a specialist.
Initially, he repaired wooden carts and work tools, and later he became a carpenter directly. A commission for granting professional categories was also set up there. Faiku took the exam and qualified, receiving the V (fifth) category, as a specialist carpenter, which served him throughout his life.
He got married, taking a wife from the Çotaj family of Hotolisht. Together with the girl’s family, they organized a “kidnapping” (elopement) so that her family would not suffer consequences. They gave birth to and raised 5 children, 2 sons and 3 daughters. In 1969, after many difficulties and obstacles, he managed to get permission to work in the Librazhd Commercial Enterprise. “I was very careful,” he recounts. “For some time, I noticed that a spy placed by the State Security was following me, who constantly provoked me, but couldn’t achieve anything.”
He worked there until 1992, as a carpenter, with dedication and high conscience, gaining the respect of the enterprise’s administration and his workmates. Persecution, social differentiation, and contempt towards “kulak” families during the time of the dictatorship became a common phenomenon, so much so that for many people of the time, indoctrinated with the spirit of so-called socialist ideas, it seemed normal.
It is regrettable that, generally speaking, no sign of remorse is noticeable from the perpetrators. And not only that, but even in discussions organized in television studios, there are still historians or researchers who try to downplay this harsh class war that prevailed throughout all the years of the communist regime in Albania. / Memorie.al
To be continued in the next issue
