AI is now the latest global craze. It appears to be the solution to everything. It is, no doubt, a good helping hand in every branch of scientific research. It is also replacing humans in doing many tasks that are repetitive such as data entry, customer service, bookkeeping, manufacturing assembly and transportation (driving cars). Even the jobs of paralegals (assistants to lawyers), accountants and some writers might be taken over by AI. But Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama has broken all records by raising the status of AI as a cabinet minister who would run the public administration as well as public procurement department of his government.
The aim is to provide Albania with a corruption-free public procurement set up. This virtual Cabinet Minister named Diella meaning 'sunshine' in Albanian, is powered by AI. It is expected that Diella, a bot that had already been guiding applicants through a process to obtain official documents and now a fully-fledged minister with the help of AI would revolutionise the system of governance of the small, southeast European nation in the Balkan Peninsula. One may recall that in the past, under Albanian communist dictator, Enver Hoxha, Albania became one of the most isolated and repressive regime in Europe. However, with the fall of communism between 1991 and 1992 and the downfall of Enver Hoxha, what was then called, 'De-Enverization' of Albania began. The country then sought to end its isolation through closer ties with the West and initiated its transition in 1991 from a centrally planned economy to a market-based one in 1991. The country joined the Council of Europe in 1995 and became a member of NATO in 2009. A candidate for accession to EU, the country hopes to become a member EU by 2030, a timeline publicised by the country's current Prime Minister, Edi Rama. But the main obstacle to his country's becoming a EU member is corruption. Hence is this dive to eliminate corruption through appointing an AI-minister. It is yet another experiment by an Albanian leader to see if technology can do the job of a politician whose tasks involve making decisions on a host of issues that are often very complex and beyond the range of a digital system based basically on the information already known and recorded in computer servers.
But humans often experience completely new situations, the knowledge of which is yet to be broken down into digital bits and bytes and made available to the computer systems that can mimic human intelligence and make decisions independently, called AI. Edi Rama who won a fourth term in office in May and introduced his cabinet on Thursday (September 11) insists that Diella, meanwhile, has dealt with more than a million applications on the country's e-Albania, a governmental digital platform, where public services found in the offices and physical counters of the institutions are offered electronically. However, questions have been raised as Albania's constitution provides that a government minister must be a mentally competent citizen aged at least 18.
Does AI fit this definition to qualify as an Albanian government minister? The opposition, Democratic Party, has already labelled Rama's move as both unconstitutional and ridiculous.
Mr. Rama thinks since AI has no bias, or prejudice like human beings, it will be able to evaluate tenders impartially. But it all depends how the algorithms or the 'step-by-step set of instructions of the AI are designed to solve a problem. Now if the human who sets the instructions in Deilla's algorithm has particular bias, Dieilla's decisions will not be impartial. There are indeed instances of in-built biases in the algorithms of social media and job recruitment software of different companies in the West. So, Diella or any AI, for that matter, may not after all be the ultimate answer to administrative corruption as Mr. Rama would like to think!
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