New Berisha-Meta Government

TIRANA, Sep 2 – Conservative Democratic Party’s Prime Minister Sali Berisha started talks Wednesday with the leftist Socialist Movement for Integration’s Ilir Meta on the forming of the new cabinet.
Meta will be Berisha’s deputy and also foreign minister to replace Genc Pollo and Lulzim Basha respectively. Dritan Prifti will replace Genc Ruli as the minister of economy and energy. Petrit Vasili will replace Anila Godo as health minister.
The LSI will also have the post of the deputy parliament speaker now held by Neritan Ceka of the centre-rightist Democratic Alliance, one of Berisha’s allies.
These choices were made known by Berisha at the news conference announcing the results of the negotiations.
Berisha’s Democrats have won 70 seats together with allies after the June 28 parliamentary poll. That figure is not enough to create a new government as one more is needed in the 140-seat parliament.
Meta’s LSI has won four seats, thus giving assurances to Berisha for a safe governing over the next four years.
Both Berisha and Meta have said their cooperation could extend further than these four years.
The four-year governing coalition is based on the main thread of the country’s integration into the European Union.
Taking the country ahead in such steps (Tirana is expecting Brussels to start negotiations with it as a candidate country for the EU) will be the main goal of the governing project in the four years to come.
Albania is also expecting to get the visa free regime, likely next year, after it was not included in the white list together with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), Montenegro and Serbia this summer for not fulfilling some of the road map set by the European Union.
Berisha has pledged to Albanians they will enjoy the visa free regime for the EU Shengen countries in the first year of the second mandate. That means by summer next year, when Brussels has said it will reconsider Albania’s request.
Meta said this agreement will speed up reforms to take the country faster toward the European Union.
Besides announcing the new cabinet list, only with the LSI members, Berisha and Meta also dealt with the other allies and their place in the new cabinet and also the opposition leader Edi Rama.
Berisha said that all the allies of the centre-right coalition will be part of the new government based on the votes they received in the June 28 poll. He mentioned no names but said that negotiations with them would start after those with the LSI, which he called as essential.
Probably more than Berisha, Meta focused much on Rama, his mistakes and also his ‘push’ in creating such a coalition with his efforts to sideline LSI based on the new electoral system.
Both Berisha and Meta also said they would run together in the next election in 2011, in local polls and further continue their coalition in the next parliamentary poll.