The Prime Minister of Australia, Anthony Albanese accepts with "proud" his Albanian roots

The Prime Minister of Australia, Anthony Albanese has proudly acknowledged his Arberian roots from Barletta, Puglia, in front of the Albanian ambassador in Canberra and the Albanian-Australian community.

The town of Barleta lies in the south of Italy, in the region of Puglia. A large community of arborists lives in Apulia. It is believed that around 100,000 Arbërs live there and the father of the Australian prime minister is also from this community.

Who is Anthony Albanese, the story of his life as in the movies, the meeting with his father after 40 years narrated by journalist Ruben Avxhiu

Anthony Albanese is the son of an Arber sailor, Carlo Albanese from the south of Italy, but with an Australian mother (of Irish descent).

The parents met during a trip through Europe of Maryanne Ellery. He worked on the ferry the Australian girl was traveling on. It was love at first sight. They soon got married and lived together for eight months. Then he had died in an accident and his mother had returned to live in Australia.

At least that was the story Anthony knew as a child. This was the story that even the extended family, the neighborhood and everyone who knew them knew.

When he turned 14, his mother sat him down at the table and told him another story. His father had not died in the accident, they had had a love story but then separated. The beautiful romantic story of two young people in Europe ended when she discovered that she was pregnant. There, the boy from Arbër had told her that they could not marry together, because he had a fiancé in his village and he could not break the engagement. Maryanne was shocked by the answer.

Soon the relationship broke down and she returned, four months pregnant, to her parents' home with a major problem. It was a Catholic family in the 1960s and it was scandalous. The solution was to weave an untrue story. There he decided to buy a ring, registered at the local municipality with his boyfriend's last name and invented the story of the accident.

Anthony called his father dead even after he found out he might be alive. He had not been a part of his life, nor had he wanted to be a part of it. It was only after his mother's death in 2002 that he became interested in the company that owned the ferries of nearly half a century ago and a historian to dig into the archives.

After several years of research that also included the registers of Italian pensioners employed on ferries and ships of the time, they managed to find the name, address and even a telephone number of Carlo Albanese. He lived in Barleta, Italy, and all the data and the date guaranteed that he was the father of the young politician (the 36-year-old Albanian was elected deputy prime minister of one of the Australian states at that time).

The news was emotional for him. He didn't know how to act. Did it make sense for him to travel to Italy to meet her? A right-wing senator, Amanda Vanstone, had become Australia's ambassador to Italy and knew his story. She immediately agreed to help him.

Coincidentally, one of the diplomats of the Australian embassy in Rome, Lisa Golden, was Carlo Albanese's maternal cousin. Lisa spoke Italian very well and helped connect them. Anthony Albanese planned the trip to Italy, while the diplomat undertook to have the first conversation with the elderly man who also did not know he had a son. The phone conversation had not gone well. Carlo was hard of hearing with his ears.

The Australian diplomat then wrote a letter to her cousin to better explain the situation. Then he called again, and spoke to the arborist's wife. Just a day before Anthony Albanese's arrival in Italy, a family relative called from Barleta to explain. She was a lawyer and the next day she received them both at her law office. He asked them why they wanted to meet Carlo Albanese. Anthony told him he believed he was his father. "I don't want anything from him. No money or anything else. I just want to meet him."

In the end, the lawyer told him that she would talk to Carlos' son and try to convince him. When they went out on the street, the Italian politician was in tears.

The next morning, Carlo met them at the studio with his daughter and son. Elegant and well dressed, but barely able to hear. They hugged. Everyone had tears in their eyes.

They sat down to talk. Carlo still spoke a little English. He asked her about her mother and her life. "He was a noble man," says Anthony. "I guessed why mother had fallen in love with him. It had charm. He was smart. Generous, interesting and hardworking. He had his family above everything."