Berisha, Meta to start negotiations next week
TIRANA, Aug 12 – The governing Democratic Party of Prime Minister Sali Berisha and the small leftist Socialist Movement for Integration Party of former premier Ilir Meta have agreed to start their negotiations next week (Aug. 20th) for the forming of the new cabinet.
First they will discuss the main issues of their programmes that the new cabinet should be founded on and then have it ready by end of month, Aug 30.
That means the cabinet will be ready for the first session of the parliament, expected likely between Sep. 3-5.
Until now there has been an informal meeting of the two party leaders but they were not considered as official talks to form the new cabinet.
Berisha’s Democrats won 70 seats in the June 28 parliamentary election with their coalition. IT also includes one from the Republican Party and one from the Justice for Integration party, or the Cams party.
The SMI won four seats. Both parties agreed soon after the polls to create a coalition. First Berisha came out to make the call and in less than two hours Meta responded positively, thus making it possible that the new cabinet has 74 votes in the 140-seat parliament.
That sparked the anger of the main opposition leftist Socialist Party of Tirana Mayor Edi Rama who said that “bazaar” had been prepared ahead of the polls. He also accused the new coalition of being created in order to divide the public money in many projects over the next four years.
The new cabinet will be based on the main target of integrating Albania into the European Union. Both parties said that European integration was the main tool to take the country ahead in the process.
Both parties have allegedly prepared the names for the posts they will have in the new cabinet. They are being kept secret in order to not let the country get involved in another debate over them.
But Berisha should also take into consideration the demands of the Republican and the other coalition party that have one lawmaker each. At the same time he will also likely try to please the other political parties that made up his political coalition, 16, though they do have not won any parliament post.
The opposition Socialists have said they will enter the parliament but they will not politically recognize the results of the polls and also any other institution, that is the government, which they call illegitimate.
They have said that they will investigate the manipulation or the abuse of the vote with their presence in the parliament and will also monitor how the new government will make other steps to take the country to a visa free regime.
