Albania Political Briefing: a President and His Political Melodrama Marsela Musabelliu

ISSN: 2560-1601

Vol. 27, No. 1 (Al)

March 2020

Albania political briefing: A President and his political melodrama Marsela Musabelliu

1052 Budapest Petőfi Sándor utca 11.

+36 1 5858 690 Kiadó: Kína-KKE Intézet Nonprofit Kft. [email protected] Szerkesztésért felelős személy: Chen Xin

Kiadásért felelős személy: Huang Ping china-cee.eu 2017/01

A President and his political melodrama

Introduction The President of the Republic of Albania, Ilir Meta, is present in the Albanian political scene since 1991. By all considerations, he has been a pivotal figure for the country as well an extremely polarizing one. Raised and acclaimed politically in the lines of the Socialist Party (PS), he distanced himself from the historic leader of the PS, Fatos Nano, and created the Socialist Movement for Integration (LSI) in 2004 - by irrevocably fragmenting the Albanian Left and creating so a third political force. As to date, he holds a record for being the youngest person in Albanian history to have served as Prime Minister; at the age of 30, he was PM from 1999 to 2002. He went on being Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2002 to 2003 and again from 2009 to 2010; held positions as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy, Trade, and Energy and Chairman of the Parliament of Albania from 2013 to 2017. In 2020, Ilir Meta, calls for popular gathering against a Government who’s votes elected him President in 2017, with the majority of votes in Parliament controlled by the Socialists.

The “covenant” To all Albanians, this word recalls the first “covenant” on March 2nd, 1444, held in Lezhë. It was the covenant of the Albanian Princes under the leadership of national hero Skanderbeg, in the war against the Turkish invaders. On February 19th, 2020, the President the President of the Republic calls for a similar act against the Government of his own country. From the Presidency, Meta announced a "covenant" with the people and promised that the institutions will be returned to them, to this end a protest would be held on March 2nd. He stated: “There is an ongoing Coup d’état from the Government itself. Today, this building is the only castle unfortunately, but unbreakable and unstoppable for the protection of the Constitution.” It is becoming en vogue for Albanian politicians to recall glorious historical figures and moments to incite the mases, justify their actions, and perhaps try to idolize themselves or their agenda. The invitation to citizens to manifest for them to restore constitutional order and give back institutions to the people seems like a call for revolution. However, are Albanians sympathetic to these calls for actions - calls coming from a person in power for 30 years, against a system that he helped build himself? Does the President have the moral grounds to call for action? The President represents the national unity of the country; the same is calling for revolt.

On the other hand, the situation is a total legal dead-end. Whatever measures are taken, from President Meta or from Prime Minister Rama, all scenarios in paper actually bring nowhere. Scenario one: President issues a decree that dissolves the Parliament, if the Parliament does not comply, the Constitutional Court should decide - but there is no quorum in the Constitutional Court. Scenario two: the Parliament dismisses the President, if the President does not comply, the Constitutional Court should decide – again, there is no quorum in the Constitutional Court. Until there is a fully functional Constitutional Court in Albania, no legal solution can be served, so the fix should be achieved politically.

An Albanian March of marches? A march, a rally, a mass gathering of Albanians - the President called it everything except a protest. In the afternoon of March 2nd, Meta went out of his office into facing a crowed, that he had publicly summoned for weeks. As soon as he stepped on the podium, he knelt down in front of the attendees and made a symbolic gesture: an eagle with his hands. At the opening of the gathering, some students displayed a large Albanian flag while the National Anthem was playing in the background. He called for a “Red and Black Spring” and unlike the opposition protests of one year prior, there were no signs of political parties’ flags or symbols. At this rally, the only key figure was President Ilir Meta, while the opposition remained in the shadows, but they were there. The leader of the Democratic Party (Basha) and Meta’s wife, now leading the Socialist Party for Integration (Kryemadhi), took very good care of not giving party-line nuances to this rally. The highpoint of the event was Meta signing decree against the Law that stripped the President of his power to swear by new Constitutional Judges; furthermore, citizens were asked to join him when signing another decree the one on potentially dissolving Parliament. As extreme as it seem, the President can do it, dissolve the Parliament with a decree, if it will be actually enforced, that is another issue; asking citizens to join him on March 15th, so that he could give some pathos to what he is intending to do is another step in trying to legitimize his will. Meta also accused the international community and their representatives present in Albania, that for years they functioned as a criminal organization and that they “gambled” with the sovereignty of the country. He also threatened that if the majority and the international community would not take this decree seriously, he would storm into the Parliament, which he claims to be illegitimate.

Meta's political protagonism was obvious and the scene/attention was all his’ – he was threating and directly challenging Prime Minister Edi Rama with this move. Rama on the other hand, with a total negligence stated that the President will never dissolve the Parliament and continued by adding that these behaviors of Meta are nothing new. In fact, in June 2019, the president did the same thing by issuing a decree for annulment of the Local Elections date, and yet no other institution considered it. Some called the President paranoid, some called him preposterous and to the rest this is just another public “tantrum” with political shades. The issue is not the rally per se; the implications and potential ramification of this event in the political scene are numerous and might end in reshuffling the major figures and shifting balances in many aspects.

Is there a chance of resizing and reshaping the Albanian opposition after the Presidency is “radicalized” and calls for extreme measures? Meta’s protagonism and his position as the sole initiator of this rally placed him in the spotlight once again. For many years now, Albanian analysts have argued that the limited powers of the Presidency do not fit with the “political appetite” of the current president. Indeed, Meta is much more active than the competences that his office would allow. The Presidency of the Republic in Albania has been (from 1997 onwards), mostly appointed to some unifying, subtle and complaisant individuals whose job was mainly ceremonial. However, this is not the case for Meta, his actions are louder and his rhetoric has no precedents. The presence of the leader of the opposition Basha in the rally, as well as the presence of his predecessor, Berisha, made the Democratic Party (PD) an accessory to the call for action from the President and demonstrated to the country that the biggest opposition force is now following, but shouldn’t they lead? In fact, the PD is the second largest political party as of last elections aft: PS 764,750 votes or (48%), PD 456,413 votes (28%) and LSI, which is also the party that Meta created 225,901 votes (14%). So, with this numbers in mind it is obvious to ask, why is Basha complying? As speculations and rumors started to flow recently, discontent for a non-active Basha is visible since years; some went even further as to assume that the future of the Albanian (united) opposition will be in the hands of the current President Meta. As all assumptions remain open to interpretations, for the time being it is only fair to state the opposition is united again, displaying a unified front against Edi Rama and his Government. Even though this unified front seems more a “marriage of convenience rather than love”, it will be interesting to see how they political interests will converge in the near future.

What this rally actually initiated is a shift of the political dialectic from the opposition vs. the majority, to the President vs. the majority. The fact that there were no political signals in the event does not make it less of a political display. In many agree that the country is in a constitutional crisis that by its very nature requires urgent solutions. The very urgency of resolving this crisis will somehow determine the severity or normality with, which the country will go to the next parliamentary elections.

Conclusions (To be continued) The calls for action from the Albanian President were displayed on daily bases and the entire machinery for assembling people for a rally was ready to go until March 9th, when the first cases of COVID-19 were confirmed in the country. As it should, the attention shifted and immediate measures from the Government entered in force within 24-hours; all education institutions were shut down, within 48-hours the majority of public recreational areas were shut down as well and of course all the future rallies, gatherings, large grouping of people, etc. As the country is in total lockdown, the rally intended for March 15th, is not happening. It is not canceled, just postponed, at least in public declarations. This political and legal struggle between the Parliament and the Government on one side, and the President on the other might resume in the future weeks; however, it is our understanding the total paralyzing of the country due to the lockdown might give different nuances to this public struggle. Finally, the most perplexing idea on the political future of the country - after this rally full of nationalist and sovereigntist symbols, in the name of the people and slogans like “Albania first” – might be the fact that this is the initial stage of an embryonic development to what might be the first Albanian populist movement.