Albanian actress Anila Bisha faces a complex problem after a three-decade artistic career, finding herself suddenly the victim of a government official generated by artificial intelligence, using her face and voice without her permission. She was initially pleased to be of service to people, but this required hard work. This came after Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama announced the appointment of the "first minister generated by artificial intelligence." Amid widespread local and international media attention, the "industrial minister" gave a speech in parliament, saying, "I am not here to replace people, but to help them," according to AFP. While many celebrated this move, Bisha was in shock: she found herself playing a role she had never consented to. The 57-year-old actress told AFP: "I couldn't believe when I saw myself giving a speech in parliament and hearing my voice saying I was a minister," adding, "I was in shock and cried a lot." Bisha had agreed at the beginning of 2025 to let her face and voice be used for a virtual assistant on a government portal to provide public services. To create an interactive and realistic avatar, she spoke for hours, with every movement of her mouth and every sound recorded, allowing the chat program, named "Diela" (sun in Albanian), to respond to user requests. In a few months, "Diela" recorded nearly one million interactions and issued over 36,000 documents through the platform, a success praised by both the government and users. However, in September, the prime minister unexpectedly "promoted" the chatbot to "Minister of Public Procurement," a step he promised would lead to combating corruption in the sector. This sparked sharp criticism from the opposition and experts who raised constitutional and accountability issues. Bisha, however, considers that "the use of my image and voice for political purposes is of the utmost seriousness to me," noting that the contract she signed with the government only allows for her image to be used on the e-services platform, and its validity expired at the end of 2025. Not only has the government ignored her requests regarding the use of her face and voice, but it seems to be expanding their use. In October, Rama said that "Diela" is "pregnant" and will soon "give birth" to 83 children, one for each parliamentary deputy. This disgusted Bisha, who says, "People who don't like the prime minister hate me, and this hurts me deeply." Amid this, despair set in for Bisha over the possibility of reaching a settlement with the government, leading her to launch a legal course against "Diela." On Monday, an administrative court rejected her request to suspend the use of her image pending a ruling on the case. Her lawyer confirmed that she will appeal it in the coming days, demanding compensation of one million euros. A government spokeswoman said in a statement that the lawsuit is closer to "nonsense... but we welcome the opportunity to resolve this matter once and for all before the judiciary." Bisha insists on going all the way to reclaim her right to her image, even if it means resorting to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, saying, "I don't know what could happen to my voice and my image."
