Zog of Albania

His Majesty King Zog, born Ahmed Bey Zogu (October 8, 1895–April 9, 1961), was an Albanian prime minister (1922-1924), president (1925-1928), and king (1928-1939 and 1943-1946, the latter period in name only).

Background and early political career

Ahmed Zogu was born in Castle Burgajet, Albania to Xhemal Pasha Zogu and Sadijé Toptani. He was a member of the royal house of Skanderbeg, which, by the time of his birth, was a feudal beylik family ruling over the city of Mati. As a young man during the First World War Zogu was pro-Austria-Hungary, counter to Albanian tradition which had tended to align with Eastern Europe or the Ottoman Turks.

In 1911, on the death of his father, aged 16, Zogu became Hereditary Governor of Mati and Chief of the Gheg clan.

He was detained at Vienna 1917–1918 and in Rome 1918–1919, before returning to Albania 1919.

Zogu held ministerial posts in the fledgling Albanian government that began in 1920. His political support included southern feudal landowners called beys (Turkish for village chieftain) and noble families in the north along with merchants, industrialists and intellectuals. Zogu became leader of a major reformist party and later a prime minister of the republican government. In 1923 he was shot and wounded in parliament. His primary rivals were Luigj Gurakuqi and Fan S. Noli.

He held the post of Minister for the Interior March to November 1920, 1921–1924 and 1925, Minister for War 1925, general and comand-in-chief of the Albanian forces 1921–1922.He also served as Governor of Skutari 1920–1921

A leftist revolt led by Noli forced Zogu into exile in June 1924. He returned to Albania with the assistance of Yugoslavia-based White Russian troops.

Albanian president

He was oficialy elected to post of president of the newly proclaimed republic by the Constituent Assembly on January 21, 1925, officially taking office February 1. Zogu's government followed the European model, while large parts of Albania still had a social structure that was unchanged from the days of Ottoman rule, and most villages were serf plantations run by the beys. A Muslim himself, his reforms included the prohibition of veils and cruelty to animals. Zogu's principal ally was Italy, which loaned his government funds in exchange for a role in its fiscal policy. During his presidency, serfdom was gradually eliminated, and Albania began to take shape as a nation (rather than a feudal patchwork of local beys) for the first time since the death of Skanderbeg. The came the kingdom.

Problems with Italy

The growing power of Italy in Albania was known clerly to everyone. Zog was forced not to refuse to renew the 1926 First Treaty of Tiranë. Even trough this influence,the King kept British officers in the Gendarmerie against the Italians,who pressured Zog to remove them.In 1932 and 1933 Albania was unable to pay the interest payments on its loans from the Society for the Economic Development of Albania,and teh Italians use this to present the dominance.They demanded that Tiranë would name Italians in charge of the Gendarmerie;then join Italy in a customs union,affterwords to grant the Italian Kingdom control of Albanias sugar,telegraph,and electrical monopolies,and finaly for the Albanian government to establish teaching of the Italian language in all Albanian schools,witch was swiftly refused by king Zog andn in refusal,he ordered for the national budget to be slashed by 30 %,dismissed all Italian military advisers,and nationalized Italian-run Roman Catholic schools in the northernof Albania to decrease Italian influence between the population of Albania.

Albanian King

Zogu crowned himself King of the Albanians on September 1, 1928 and declared a constitutional monarchy similar to the contempory regime in Italy (including a strong police force). He instituted a Zogist salute (flat hand over the heart with palm facing forwards) and claimed to be a successor of Gjergj Kastriot Skanderbeg. Zog hoarded gold coins and precious stones, which were used to back Albania's first paper currency; his household expenses hovered near 2% of the national budget. He was mostly ignored by European monarchs.

Zog's mother, Sadijé, was declared "Queen Mother of the Albanians", and he also gave his brother and sisters royal status as prince and princesses Zogu. One of his sisters, Senijé, Princess Zogu (1908–1969), married His Imperial Highness Prince Shehzade Mehmed Abid Efendi of Turkey, a son of Sultan Abdul Hamid II.

Zog also named himself Field Marshal of the Royal Albanian Army 1th September 1928.

Zog attempted to establish his regime's legitimacy by ruling as a constitutional monarch. His kingdom's constitution forbade any prince of the royal house from serving as prime minister or a member of the cabinet and contained provisions for the potential extinction of the royal family. Ironically, in light of later events, the constitution also forbade the union of the Albanian throne with that of any other country. Under the Zogian constitution, the King of the Albanians, like the King of the Belgians, exercised royal powers only after taking an oath before Parliament (although in the event Zog took the oath in the presence of the Constituent Assembly).

During Zog's reign, the Albanian army was a major problem due to the price of its modernization and equipment.

Zog's regime brought stability to Albania and the king organized an educational system. Albania's fiscal dependence on Italy continued to increase at a time when Italian dictator Mussolini was extending his sphere of influence into the Balkans and exerted increasing control over Albania's finances and army. During the worldwide depression of the early 1930s Zog's government became almost completely dependent on Mussolini. Grain had to be imported from abroad and many Albanians emigrated.

In April 1938 King Zog married Countess Geraldine Apponyi de Nagy-Apponyi, a Catholic who was half Hungarian and half American. Their only child, Crown Prince Leka Zogu, was born April 5, 1939.

Two days later, on April 7, 1939, Italian troops entered Albania. Mussolini declared Albania a protectorate under Italy's King Victor Emmanuel III. Zog and his family fled into exile in Greece,Turkey, England, Egypt, the USA, and finally France.

The dangers to Zog during his reign

Albanians in the time of his reign were very acquanted with the laws of blood vengence. The first of Zog's mistakes was to harshly break the ingagement with the daughter Shefqet Bey Verlaci soon after his coronation. Verlaci had by custom the "duty" to try to kill him. The king made more than a few enemies and frequently surrounded himself with a personal guard, avoiding public appearances, which in his case were very rare. In 1931 Zog visited Vienna, and his bodyguards had to gun-fight his would-be assassins.

Life in exile

Zog, after leaving Albania, lived in exile in various countries. Records of his conversations with friends and familly say that he wished to set up a feudal kingdom outside of Albania. He worked as a jet setter. In 1951 he bought the Knollwood estate in Muttentown. The estate was seen described by people as "a castle" and possessed 60 rooms. Nevertheless, Zog never moved into the mansion, and a local legend holds that he has hidden his treasure inside the mansion's walls, which is rather unlikely, seeing that he had no "great treasure" to hide, and he would rather have left it to his son Leeka. The mansion then became a target of vandalism and parts of it have been torn down.

The king died in France in a hospital in Hauts-de-Seine 9th April 1961 and is currently buried at the Thiais Cemetery, Ille de France in Paris.

Legacy

During World War II royalist Albanian resistance in the north was largely ineffective, later merging with communist insurgents (partisans) made up of former serfs from the south led by Yugoslavian militants. While the Albanian establishment mostly chose collaboration with the Italians and Germans, it was the uneducated partisans who took control with Russian support as the war ended.

The king's exile took him first to Greece and then to Great Britain before he finally settled in France. Zog attempted to reclaim his throne but Albania had fallen firmly into the Soviet sphere and a Stalinist communist government led by Enver Hoxha would remain in power for 45 years. Zog abdicated on January 2, 1946 but retained his claim to the throne. He died in Suresnes, France on April 9, 1961. The former Queen Geraldine died in 2002.

In 1997, well after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the fall of Albania's communist regime, Zog's son, Leka Zogu (who since 1961 had been calling himself Leka I, King of the Albanians), returned despite resistance from the Albanian government under Sali Berisha. A referendum was held on the restoration of the monarchy in 1997, in which 66.7 percent of voters favored a republican government; Leka declared the result fraudulent. During the early 2000s, Leka Zogu was active in the country's politics, characterizing the socialist government (which was derived for the most part from former communist party officials) as "mafiosi" with little expertise. The socialists' difficulties in creating jobs and maintaining social order made Zogu seem like an attractive alternative to many Albanians.

See also

• History of Albania

External links

• Photos of the royal family
• Article
• Photos
• More photos

Bibliography

O.S. Pearson, Albania and King Zog, 2005 (ISBN 1845110137).