Tina Gaber, the newlywed wife of the Prime Minister, posted a video on Instagram with a mafia soundtrack playing in the background. The voice in the video says: “I am Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria.”
Our readers are probably aware of who Pablo Escobar was. He was an unimaginably wealthy cocaine kingpin and leader of the Colombian mafia in Medellín. He was also a politician at one point, but he made his money by smuggling illegal substances into the USA. El País reports that between 1989 and 1993, he was responsible for approximately 5,000 deaths related to mafia wars or assassinations. The film platform Netflix made a documentary about him called Narcos.
The composition of Tina Gaber’s video leaves little room for doubt. She is in the middle of the black-and-white video, wearing a wedding dress and sunglasses. Next to her are her bridesmaids or “ladies-in-waiting.” The caption continues in the same vein, saying that her “army” of friends “has her back.” “It’s wonderful to have a husband, but behind every happy woman stands an army of fearless friends who have her back,” she wrote.
The video can be viewed on her profile – here: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DOjL3K1CtoW/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link
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Underneath the post, there was a series of comments from her supporters, who are clearly also enthusiastic about mafia iconography. Some of them are well-known online influencers, just like Tina Gaber herself. On the social network X, however, there were many more critical comments. For example, an online commentator with the username Kajtimir Vojsk wrote: “Wait, what!? For her (pre-)wedding photo with her bridesmaids, Tina Gaber posed in mafia chic, and she backed it up with a quote that says ‘I am Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria’. The new wife of the Slovenian Prime Minister identifies with the biggest cocaine baron? It’s hard to get more Balkan than that.”
A reader alerted us to the video, saying something similar: “For some, Pablo Escobar may be a role model and an icon, but he is certainly not synonymous with a democratic and developed country where the rule of law prevails and economic and intellectual progress is the norm.”
The pro-government web portal 24ur also reported on the video, stating that Gaber “delighted” her followers with the post in question.
S. K.
