In the war against the German Nazis in the fortress of Margëlliç (Patos), Mustafa Matohiti, a participant in the Anti-Fascist National Liberation War, and Hero of the People, was killed. He was born in Lekdush (Tepelena). For revolutionary activity against Zog’s regime, he was imprisoned several times (1937, 1938). He opposed the Italian occupation and immediately threw himself into anti-fascist activities in Saranda and in the province of the Coast (of the Ionian Sea). At the beginning of 1942, he went into illegality. He propagated the line of the Anti-Fascist National Liberation War to the broad masses of the people of the province of Kurvelesh, Tepelena, Përmet, Saranda, etc. He was nicknamed “Nightingale Matohiti” for his oratory. Member of the Albanian Communist Party, in June 1942. Political commissar of the Kurveleshi detachment and in charge of the Party cell of this area (1942), participated at the head of the partisan forces in the battles for the liberation of Gusmar and all of Kurveleshi. He was then assigned to the Party affairs in the province of Përmet, Tepelena and Kurvelesh (1942-1943) and, with the formation of the Partisan Group IV “Çamëria”, was appointed its commissar (1943) and then commissar of the VI Assault Brigade (1944). He stood out as a brave fighter and a skilled political and military cadre. The bust of Mustafa Matohiti is located in the city of Tepelena. (In the photo: Mustafa Matohiti)
Text: Albanian encyclopedic dictionary – Vol. 2 , Academy of Sciences of Albania, “Kristalina-KH”, Tirana, 2008, page 1658.
Photo: © Xhoxhi L., personal archive
Graphic processing: AHCF
