The speech held to the ceremony of saying goodbye to Haxhi Thaci - march 2025

In this sad day, I am here next to the mother and wife of Hashim Thaçi

I came here to say goodbye to Baca Haxhi, with the deepest respect for this family identified with the history of Kosovo thanks to one of its sons, Hashim, and also fraternized with my family, through Hashim.

This is a sad day.

And on this sad day I am here with you, mother Hyrë, not in place of Edi, but first and foremost because I know well what it means to be the parent of a politician, and especially the mother of a politician. I have experienced it closely with Edi's mother.

And on this sad day, I am here with your entire family, which today is missing two men.

I know even better what it means to be the wife of a politician, and even more so the wife of a leader, where all the winds blow and never cease for a moment. I experience it every day.

But what I don't know at all on this sad day is what it means to have a child with a rifle in his hand, fighting in the mountains, or being a prisoner of his own patriotism somewhere far away, in a place without a sky, and no one knows how long. It must be an endless anguish.

That is why I couldn’t stay in Tirana, but I wanted to be here today, next to Hashim's mother and wife. The mother and wife of the commander, as we always call him at home, who on this painful day of parting must continue to be far away, in the battle. I don't believe that an absence can be so many times greater than a presence, on a day like this. And that's why it radiates far beyond these walls, like a bell of remembrance for the suffering of tens of thousands of men and women of this land, but also for the sacrifice of the entire people of Kosovo in paying the high price of freedom.

May the earth be light upon you, Baca Haxhi.