Local elections in Albania

The Economist | Eastern Approaches

ALBANIANS are voting in local elections today. Unless the polls end in violence, this is unlikely to get the pulses of international news editors racing. For Albania, however, this is a big deal. Albert Rakipi, head of the Albanian Institute for International Studies, goes as far as to compare the poll—particularly the fight for Tirana, the capital—to the battle of Stalingrad [paywall]. (Albania-watchers can follow Balkan Insight's live blog of proceedings today.)

Normal political life in Albania has been on hold for almost two years. In June 2009 Sali Berisha, the leader of the Democratic Party, won a narrow victory in the polls which enabled him to scrape together a governing coalition with his erstwhile foe Ilir Meta, who had broken away from the Socialist Party. However, Edi Rama, the mayor of Tirana and leader of the Socialists, claimed that Mr Berisha had stolen the election.

Ever since Albanian politics has rolled from crisis to crisis. The Socialists boycotted parliament for a while, hunger strikers camped outside Mr Berisha’s office and, most dramatically, on January 21st an opposition rally went dramatically wrong. Four people were killed when the Republican Guard, inside a government building, opened fire. The Socialists called murder; Mr Berisha said the protestors had been trying to launch a coup with guns disguised as umbrellas and pens.

In 2009 Albania joined NATO, and in December its citizens became members of the coveted club of people from non-EU countries who can travel inside Europe’s 25-member Schengen zone without a visa. So all this is pretty embarrassing for Albania. The political turmoil has damaged its EU accession process, and Brussels will be closely watching today's election proceedings.

If the coalition led by Mr Berisha does well, the prime minister may well decide to go for an early general election. That, says Mr Rakipi, would be “a moral and political victory over the opposition’s claims of vote-rigging” in 2009. But if the Socialist-led coalition does well that would bolster it in its own demand for early elections.

The key battleground is Tirana. Here Mr Rama is seeking a fourth term as mayor. He is opposed by one Lulzim Basha, a close aide to Mr Berisha and his family who has held various ministerial posts, including foreign affairs, transport and telecommunications and the interior. In 2007 he was investigated for corruption; the case was dropped in 2009.

According to Mr Rakipi, what Albania needs is a clear-cut victory by one side or the other. Otherwise, he says, “we will continue to live under the tyranny of the status quo that we have seen in the past two years.”

Mr Berisha is more phlegmatic. In an interview (in French) in Le Monde he says victory would be “very good” but defeat would not be fatal. Asked about Albania’s EU accession process, he replies:

The process is unstoppable, but it must be entirely based on merit, not on a climate. Now the climate is not so warm with regard to enlargement, even without any blockage. 86% of Albanians are for integration. I find them very wise. For a small nation like mine, the European Union is almost a heaven on earth. Every step we take favours freedom, living conditions and income. Imagine: Twenty years ago we had 60,000 bunkers in Albania. Now there are 60,000 villas!

On Friday, Mr Rama told an election rally that “Sali [Berisha] is not the prime minister of Albania, but only the representative of a government turned into a regime, who talks about you but only thinks of himself.”

Mr Rakipi is surely right that it is important to end the stalemate. But that may not happen today. Will Albanians believe what they have been promised, by both sides—pledges that include everything from building trams to tax cuts to creating 300,000 new jobs? Probably not, although Albanians, of all the people in the western Balkans, are by far the most optimistic. Let’s hope today’s battle of Stalingrad ends without casualties and breaks the country’s political deadlock.