The Strike, the Issue of the Free Vote

Everyone gets a turn to fight a battle for the free vote in Albania! The question is-when. Ironically enough, fate has placed the former Prime Minister Ilir Meta, the principle, but not only author of the problematic elections of 2001, in a position today where he stands in defence of the free vote in Albania, even if this means resorting to ultimate political means: a hunger strike inside the plenary hall of the People’s Assembly. And he is right. Starting with the electoral system of 21 April and up to the planned construction of the Electoral Commissions, it is more than obvious that this is an entire system that seeks to dilute his political power and lose through endless papers, coefficients and formulas, the commissioners of the administration of the votes that Ilir Meta wins along with his party, the SMI. The Assembly of Albania has a problem which must be addressed and not merely a strike by a handful of MPs, who, at any moment, could be deprived of electricity, water or communication via mobile phones. There is a symbolic problem linked with a persevering system of electoral skullduggery, where, whenever they replace one another in office, both sides strive to put down “the smaller party.” In short, a perpetual switch of places between the aggressor and the victim. This way of reasoning must end. It is highly probable that after the upcoming elections, Edi Rama could be staging such a strike, the day after tomorrow, Sali Berisha, as he did during eight years in Opposition. This system must be tossed out once and for all. The issue of the hunger strike of eleven Albanian MPs, at the very least, seeks the solution of two problems:
The first issue the Socialist Party and the Democratic Party must solve is a spirit of tolerance in reviewing the formula of the construction of the commissions, or of the vote procedure, of the statute of the competing monitors in the elections. There are plenty of formulae, plenty of schemes to achieve this, all that’s required is that a handful of experts of all sides sit down, switch their mobile phones off and get to work. In these conditions, especially when, beyond the vote of the electorate, the DP and SP seek to do the ranking of the parties themselves as regards their sizes, arbitrarily qualifying the SDP and the RP as second biggest parties to the Left and Right, it is evident that the SMI has the right to its own commissioners. Even more so now, when an obvious tendency of the system, beginning from the changes of 21 April, has laid the foundations for this force to fight for survival. Now, the second problem that must be solved by this strike is the issue that has just arisen: The Socialist Party of Albania, as the main force of the Opposition, the bearer of hope for change of the Opposition and its supporters, of those who believe in the political rotation in 2009, in a new scheme of the electoral infrastructure, cannot be left to the mercy of possible SMI members on these commissions and that they will strive for fair and functional decision-making in the next elections. A new scheme for the commissions must simultaneously take on board the right of the SMI to be witnesses and to guard their supporters, but without conditioning the vote of the Opposition bloc on the commissions, from the center to the base. In the conditions of the current conflict, the socialists have their own right not to entrust “the golden vote” to the SMI, in other words the vote that makes the difference on the future electoral commissions from the center to the base. The prejudiced destructiveness of the SMI commission members, the way things have gone, could seriously compromise the fate of the Opposition on the whole in the upcoming elections. The SP-SMI conflict could unexpectedly be imported throughout the commissions. Once again, there are a multitude of schemes to enable the implementation of both these principles. The technicians could work towards such a solution. What could be said on Day Three of the strike is that the issues at the foundations of this strike must be resolved and not avoided.