Tirana Times editorial
Albania’s government is determined to approve a territorial and administrative reform before parliament goes on vacation in August. It has created a sense of urgency to get the plan going, as opposition to it grows.
In principle, the administrative reform is a good thing. The current high number of municipal units is expensive and inefficient for a small country like Albania, and apparently communes spend about 24 million dollars a year, on salaries alone, while generating little or no tax income on their own or making any investments into their local communities.
As such, a new territorial map that would trim the number of local governing units to 61, far less than the current more than 300, seems like a logical step.
The proof is the pudding, however. And the map the government has come up with has some problems in it. Opposition is growing by the day.
The first problem is obviously that the opposition refused to participate in drafting the administrative reform. The opposition, led by the Democratic Party of Tirana Mayor Lulzim Basha did not agree to take part, despite continuous offers like enjoying the co-chairmanship and the right of veto.
Opposition representatives said the country should make constitutional amendments on the powers of the local authorities before moving to a new territorial division.
It is clear they did not want the Socialists to be successful in the reform, in addition to fearing that the Socialists would use the changes to get a leg up in upcoming local administrative elections
Trying to add legitimacy and seeking to make sure they had enough votes to pass the reform, the Socialist-led government changed the map at the last minute to cater to a small opposition party that represents the Cham community in Albania, who came to being in Albania through massive and brutal expulsions from Greece at the end of World War II. Naturally, the map appears to have been somewhat gerrymandered to make some municipalities more ethnically or politically advantageous to the Socialists and the Chams. Naturally, the small Socialist ally that represents the Greek community is outraged. Greece is unhappy too.
The Socialists, which traditionally have been seen as less nationalistic, have stuck to their guns with the Greeks, which has led to alienation of their ally and several southern MPs.
As opposition mounts, the government was for the fist time unable to achieve a quorum Friday on approving the unrelated justice system reform.
This is, of course not new. Parties have not reached compromise in such big projects in the past. The opposition Democrats also boycotted the new constitution drafting process in 1998, which was approved in a national referendum. It stands to this day, albeit with now almost-universally-hated amendments done in 2008, approved in a rare overnight show of consensus between the two major parties.
Post-communist Albania has suffered during its 24 years since the fall of the former regime from the lack of trust between the two main political forces, that has often resulted in useless efforts and money spent for certain major projects. To make sure that the legislative reform does not end the same way – perhaps the government needs to give more time to all the actors involved to say their piece and work together for a final product that will be acceptable to all.
