Albania’s first pluralist elections of March 31, 1991 offered a big surprise when then President Ramiz Aliaj lost to the Democratic Party candidate engineer Franko Kroqi. The Head of State was famously left out of the parliament exactly in the most Leftist borough of Tirana, where the Communist Party was founded in 1941, to be transformed later into the Party of Labour and finally into the Socialist Party of Albania.

Even though 26 years later the electoral system is no longer majority but proportional, still the candidates race, based on their ranks in the lists, may offer new surprises.

For the general elections this Sunday, Edi Rama, when he was convinced the opposition would boycott the elections and tried everything to make it happen, pretended to put a challenging bet, by putting his name in the sixth place of the candidates list for the county of Vlora. He raised the personal bar exactly at the limit number of deputies his party won in Vlora in 2013, six. Four years ago, the mandates were shared like this: 6 for the Socialist Party (PS), 1 for the Socialist Movement for Integration (LSI), 1 from others in the Left coalition, later passed to PS. From the other wing, the Democratic Party (PD) won 3 mandates, the Party for Justice, Integration and Unity (PDIU) 1 deputy, Dashamir Tahiri, who now is number five in PD’s list for Vlora.

Today the situation has changed. The united opposition will participate in the elections and is making a positive campaign, while PS races alone and former ally LSI now has become a fierce enemy. In the conditions where the Socialist Party is participating in the elections without allies and the opposition competes under PD logo, based on a simple analysis, the Socialist have put the sixth mandate in this electoral area in serious discussion.

Will Edi Rama have Ramiz Aliaj’s fate of 1991, despite running, just like Rama today, in a super Leftist area and was the head of a big party in power?

If we refer to the figures of 2013, a 5-thousand-vote shrink would be enough for PS to lose the seventh mandate that it took from “other” votes and enter the danger zone for the sixth mandate, the one of the Prime Minister. This is only for the scenario when the others would stay in the same place. However, the situation would complicate even more should the opposition, united under PD logo, reach only a small raise in the county of Vlora. In case the result of 2013 repeats, PS will have again 6 mandates, PD and allies 4, LSI 1. The 12^th mandate, after the new settings, will remain orphan, but very likely PDIU will take it, despite the divisions in that county.

Recently, LSI has declared open war to PS and to Edi Rama in particular. They are making an aggressive campaign in Vlora, where they have understood the renegade Prime Minister’s mandate hangs by a thread. Leaving him out of the parliament would be Ilir Meta’s dream vendetta against the “renegade and ungrateful” Rama. Based on the recent polls, LSI’s only mandate in Vlora is guaranteed and it needs nearly six thousand votes more to take the second. Edi Rama is counteracting by playing heavily with Shkëlqim Selami, a former LSI deputy of the area.

Shpëtim Idrizi’s PDIU is also in other conditions in this election and, should it take 2500 votes more than in 2013, will take another sure mandate, in addition to that going to PD. In all the scenarios of the other parties’ growth against PS, even if PD takes the fifth mandate, LSI the second and PDIU alone takes 1 mandate, the one that loses will be PS, exactly Edi Rama’s mandate.

What makes more interesting the situation is another new factor, which should not be neglected in Vlora. It is Koço Kokëdhima’s movement Zgjidhja (The Solution), which has its center in the county and has appeared rather strong there, in the first steps of organizing. Kokëdhima has shown he has many followers there and, despite not taking part in this election, his abstaining votes could be exactly those that risk shaming Rama. Kokëdhima is campaigning aggressively in the whole country, trying to convince electors either to boycott the elections or put a big Z on the ballot paper, as a sign of refusal of this political class. The 5 thousands votes needed to risk Rama’s mandate do not seem unreachable in Kokëdhima’s mission to convince the voters not to vote. Particularly when it comes to Zgjidhja, the supporters of which were fired in the wildest avenging way and to the chance Kokëdhima has to teach a strong lesson to his former friend.

Add to this LSI’s aggressiveness, the not-so-little power of the Cham community which has been represented in the government and now feels betrayed by the Renaissance, plus the visible dissatisfaction of the population there, tired with the stalling and lies for Vlora’s by-pass and Lungomare, Himara’s revolts, etc., and it becomes clear Rama’s mandate really is in big trouble.

It hangs by a thread, but still he can save himself should he not win directly after the Sunday’s ballots. In any case, Rama has the Lezha’s scheme of the 2013 elections, when he forced winning men and women resign in order to catapult all kinds of criminals in the parliament. He can enter the parliament like this, however badly shamed and disrobed.

That’s why it is very probable we’ll see in Vlora, this Sunday, a déjà vu of what happened to Ramiz Aliaj on March 31^st 1991…

Syri.net