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Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama has won a fourth term in office. The Socialist Party he leads won an absolute majority in the parliamentary elections. But it is not only the opposition that has raised doubts about the electoral process...
Edi Rama secures an absolute majority in the Tirana parliament. More than 80 of the 140 seats are likely to go to the Socialists. Rama has yet to comment on the result, while opposition leader Sali Berisha has raised the first complaints.
Berisha speaks of government vote-buying. Two days before the election, the government had approved a kind of large-scale fine amnesty: 170,000 people were exempted from unpaid fines. For Berisha, this was a gift given to him during the election campaign: "You yourself saw that two nights before the election, fines totaling 150 million euros were waived. So, you can judge these elections for yourself," he said. Berisha called on his supporters to protest.
OSCE highlights unequal conditions
Criticism also comes from election observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE. According to them, the conditions were not the same for all parties. Farah Karimi of the OSCE Observation Mission said that the ruling party benefited extensively from state resources during the election campaign, thus gaining an unfair bonus for the office held. There are also indications that pressure was exerted on voters.
Public sector employees in particular were forced to vote for the ruling party. It was also difficult for all voters to obtain independent information from the media, Karimi said. “The concentration in the media sector, the undermining of the diversity of news sources and self-censorship by journalists, as well as the dominance of the two largest parties in reporting, limited the ability of voters to make an informed choice,” Karimi said.
"Danger to the country's European course"
Election observers also criticized Albania for ignoring numerous proposals for democratic reforms of the electoral law for years. German MEP Michael Gahler of the CDU sees this as a threat to the country's European course. "This country will not join the European Union in the state it is in now. But many things can change for the better. Therefore, I strongly recommend that all parties take these recommendations seriously," Gahler said.
Rama wants to lead Albania towards the EU
Edi Rama was elected precisely for this purpose: his number one campaign promise was to lead Albania into the EU by 2030. Journalist Frrok Çupi sees this as the sole reason for Rama's surprisingly clear election victory.
"One might wonder why the majority is so large. This is a bourgeois majority, independent of party preferences. It is about the greatest concern of the Albanian people: not to deviate from the path now."
However, Rama also benefited from the fact that the opposition is divided. It is not certain whether he will now use his majority to implement democratic reforms. Critics accuse him of increasingly seizing power in the country. /Adapted from Pamphlet by ARD/
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