The Battle for Tirana

2025-02-02 09:31:07Pikëpamje SHKRUAR NGA DARDAN MALAJ
Tirana

On May 11, the Tirana District will elect 37 deputies, one more than in the last elections of 2021. The result in this district will likely be decisive for the one at the national level. Currently, the Socialist Party has 18 mandates, PD 15, LSI 2 and PSD 1. The last three mandates were won with 13,024 votes (PD), 12,602 votes (PS) and 12,156 (PD), respectively. If there were a 37th mandate in 2021, the PS would take it with 11,939 votes.

Given the large number of voters, the Tirana Region remains the biggest hope for "small" and new parties to win a parliamentary mandate. But which of them have a realistic chance of achieving such success, potentially reducing the number of mandates for the SP and DP?

For a political force to be included in the implementation of the mandate distribution formula, it will need to have collected at least 1% of the valid votes at the national level. If we add the 76,282 registered voters from the diaspora to the number of voters in 2021 at the national level, the total number of voters reaches 1,738,556. If, for projection purposes, we keep the number of invalid votes the same as in 2021 at 5%, the number of valid votes in the entire country would be 1,651,629. Consequently, a political entity or coalition would need to receive at least 16,516 votes at the national level. Most likely, some of the small parties claiming a mandate in Tirana exceed this legal limit.

So far, 15,454 voters from abroad have been registered for the Tirana Region. By the end of the CEC term, the increase in this indicator could also increase the potential votes for new and existing "small" entities.

In 2021, the Freedom Party (formerly LSI) won 2 MPs. Its mandates on May 11 remain difficult to calculate as they are expected to be on a joint list with the Democratic Party.

The Social Democratic Party seems to be certain of a parliamentary mandate after receiving 17,664 votes in the 5 municipalities of the Tirana District in the last local elections of 2023.

Referring to the results of the 2021 elections, Agron Shehaj received 13,855 individual preferential votes on the Democratic Party list in Tirana. This makes him favored to maintain his position on May 11, confirming a mandate as an MP, thanks to the "bite" of the "electoral cake" mainly from the Basha group and Berisha's DP.

If we look at the results of the 2023 local elections, candidate Arlind Qorri of the "Together Movement" managed to receive 13,851 votes in the territory of the Municipality of Tirana alone. Adding the potential votes in the other 4 municipalities of the district, it seems that Qorri also has a high chance of securing a mandate as an MP in the capital.

The situation in the camp of Lulzim Basha's Democrats seems more complicated. In the 2023 elections in the five municipalities of the Tirana District, they collected 39,486 votes. Referring to subsequent political developments, the reconfirmation of Berisha as mayor, the retaking of the logo and headquarters by Ritshakelimi and the breakup of the Basha-Alibeaj duo, this result seems unattainable. The greatest likelihood is that at least these votes will be divided between the groups of Basha, Berisha, Alibeaj and Shehaj. The greatest probability is that Basha's party will remain at the maximum at the district level at the 12,398 votes that his candidate Roland Bejko received in 2023 in the Tirana Municipality. This could keep him within the limits of one mandate as an MP.

The chances of the alliance between Dashamir Shehi, Enkelejd Alibeaj and the Democratic Persuasion winning a parliamentary mandate do not seem very far in the horizon. LZHK at the regional level in 2023 received only 5,663 votes and would need more than a doubling of them. The same situation is in the camp of "Nisma Thurje" which at the regional level in 2023 received 6,993 votes.

Despite the polls, the unknown and impossible to compare element is the "Albania Becomes" Movement, a new entity that has no record in elections to date.

If the PSD simply retains the mandate it received in 2021, Agron Shehaj's "Mundësia" party and the Basha group could take mandates away from Sali Berisha's Democratic Party. Meanwhile, Arlind Qorri's "Bashkë" Movement and potentially Adriatik Lapaj's "Albania Becomes" could "bite" towards the left.

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