When all membership and large number of the electorship waited for a landslide victory the opposition Democratic Party (DP) managed to secure 59 out of the total of 140 parliamentary seats in the April 25 elections losing for the third consecutive time.
An analysis by this party leader Lulzim Basha paradoxically finds both ‘victory’ and ‘electoral massacre’ in the performance of DP during the last general elections after which Basha’s resignation was asked by large number of senior officials and rank-and-file members of this right-wing political force.
DP is the political force, which has entered Albania’s history as the promoter of pluralism, forming the first post-communist government to crash in 1997 after the collapse of notorious pyramid schemes.
“Compared to the 2017 elections, when the DP won 43 seats, it turns out that the number of seats won has increased by 16 seats, so there is a 37% increase in the number of seats won,” said the analysis prepared by supporters of Basha in intensive attempt to portray the reelected chairman as not-guilty for the third consecutive failure leaving the power in the hands of PM Edi Rama and Socialist Party.
The detailed analysis framed by the relevant officials of DP contained 13 points lauding the ‘victory’ and cursing ‘the electoral massacre’. The analysis said Democrats could get more seats in some constituencies, but, ironically, they could not.
Vote buying, removing the division between the party and the state, using the personal data of Albanian citizens, bribery and vote buying, temporary employment, were part of the causes of the loss of the DP, said the analysis.
Also, the sudden and unprecedented closure of the borders with Greece and North Macedonia to prevent the large Albanian diaspora and the Greek minority living mainly in Greece from coming to the polls was another cause for DP’s failure. Even the early disbursement of the € 2.5 million economic assistance fund and the addition of 20,000 families to the economic assistance program during the campaign period is considered part of the ‘electoral massacre’.
“The government allocated and paid financial benefits for newborns for the entire 4-year period that were not paid in violation of the relevant bylaws,” said the analysis.
The analysis concluded that DP’s result of 2021 is comparable only to the result of the Democratic Party list in the 2009 elections when Sali Berisha was party head, which is considered a success of DP headed by Basha.
PM Edi Rama has declared that he will government Albania for at least two other mandates to achieve the Albania 2030 vision. /Argumentum.al
