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ANALYSIS: Will there be another dramatic upheaval on May 11 in Shkodra? The role of Tom Doshi and Agron Çela

2025-04-30 22:20:51Politikë SHKRUAR NGA GJERGJ EREBARA
ANALYSIS: Will there be another dramatic upheaval on May 11 in Shkodra? The role
Shkodra

The Albanian electorate  is widely perceived as static, with the traumatic division of the communist era still determining to a significant extent the decisions of many voters today. Shkodra, a region where persecution has been rampant, is also perceived as an opposition-supporting area, but the elections of the last two decades have shown some of the most dramatic changes in voter behavior.

Voters in the Shkodra region, which includes a diverse coastal, plain, hilly and mountainous area, are expected to mandate 11 deputies in the May 11 elections, while past elections, due to the great fluctuation of voter behavior, have made it one of the battleground regions for determining the governing majority. And, while the battles have been fierce in the past, what cannot be ignored in this year's elections is the fact that, over the past two years, several sensational investigations against organized crime by the Special Structure Against Crime and Corruption, SPAK, have sent behind bars some of the key figures rumored or known for their involvement in the elections on both sides of Albanian politics.

In this context, any prediction of the outcome of May 11, based on the analysis of past results, is simply impossible because past results have been consistently influenced by the involvement of organized crime in elections and, in the shadow of past investigations and threats of current investigations into electoral crimes, any prediction must await the opening of the ballot boxes.

Dramatic reversals

The entire Shkodra region was once a stronghold of the Democratic Party, a product of the history of multiple persecutions in this region, political persecution, religious persecution, and cultural persecution. And it took more than two decades after the fall of communism for the Socialist Party to begin to penetrate politically in this area, recruiting politicians who spoke at press conferences in Gheg and recruiting politicians from among the Catholics. Prime Minister Edi Rama himself crowned the Socialists’ opening to the north when, in 2014, on the occasion of Pope Francis’ visit to Albania, he publicly declared that he had been baptized as a Catholic by his grandmother in his infancy.

The relationship between Shkodra and the Democratic Party has by no means been unconditional. Dissatisfaction has often been expressed as the area has remained traditionally disadvantaged by public investment programs. For example, the largest city in the north continues to have a two-lane road connection with Lezha and the rest of the country, a road that is almost permanently congested with traffic.

In 2009, the first time that elections were held with the closed list system at the district level, the Socialists and their allies received 35% of the vote and 4 mandates, while the Democrats and their allies received 58% of the vote and 7 mandates. Two coalitions without mandates competed in those elections; the coalition led by the SMI received 2.9% of the vote, while the Pole of Freedom coalition, a coalition led by the Movement for National Development, but which in Shkodra had the Democratic Christian Party as a key factor, received 3.5% of the vote. The Democratic Christian Party of Albania itself received over 3,300 votes, which on the one hand shows how important religious identity is for a part of the district’s population and on the other hand, the not always unconditional relationship between the Democratic Party and the Catholics of the north.

The big surprise happened in 2013, and, in this case, the key factor also had a religious-sounding name.

The coalition led by the Socialist Party and the Socialist Movement for Integration managed to take 53% of the district's votes, while the Democratic Party and its allies fell to 45%.

The Socialist Movement for Integration, with its MP Agron Çela, a local businessman, was key to this overthrow, but also an important factor was a party called the Christian Democratic Party. In alliance with the SP, this party received almost 7,000 votes. Its candidate, Mark Frroku, the brother of the party leader, who was indicted for the murder of a police chief, while Marku himself was suspected of murder, was elected MP. Mark Frroku was later found not guilty of the murder charge in court, served some time in prison on other charges, and was declared rehabilitated by the court.

Overall, in the 2013 elections, the left-wing coalition won 6 seats, while the right-wing coalition won 5, a key reversal at the national level. The Socialists won 4 seats, the same as they had won before, but their two allies, the SMI and the PKD, won one seat each.

In the 2017 elections, the opposition Democratic Party continued to lose ground, when, in Shkodra and across Albania, a significant portion of its electorate apparently decided to stay home rather than vote for it. But the Christian Democrats disappeared from the electoral map, falling to 193 votes.

In the overall result and in the fate of the majority, however, there were no fundamental changes. The Democrats in opposition again became the first force in the region with a slight advantage over the Socialists and received 5 parliamentary mandates against the Socialists' four. The SMI, this time running on its own, retained Agron Çela's mandate. What changed was that the departure of the Christian Democrats from the playing field was replaced by the arrival of the Social Democrats.

Yes, in Albania there is a party called Social Democrats, a name borrowed from the European left that opposed, in the 1930s and afterwards, the dictatorship of the proletariat established in the Soviet Union, and, meaningfully, this party in Albania was founded by a number of communists, whose leader, Skënder Gjinushi, was the only minister of the Albanian communist government who managed to maneuver in the post-communist era. Gjinushi transferred the party to politician Tom Doshi. Doshi was a Socialist Party MP who won the 2005 elections in zone 7, an area covering the sub-Shkodra area centered on the coastal village of Velipoja. He was re-elected for the Socialists in 2009 and 2013, while Edi Rama expelled him from the Socialist Party and parliamentary group in 2015 after Doshi, along with Christian Democrat MP Mark Frroku, publicly accused Ilir Meta, Rama's ally, of paying Durim Bami, an accused hitman, to get rid of them. The incident was declared fabricated in court.

Doshi won the mandate in Shkodra in 2017, but in 2018, the US administration of President Trump, in his first term, "named" him as a foreign official involved in major corruption and sanctioned him by banning him from entering the US.

The "non grata" declaration by the Americans did not prevent Doshi from winning not one, but three mandates in the 2021 elections: two in Shkodra and one in Tirana.

Doshi resigned from the party after the elections and announced an alliance with the Socialists, although the Socialists did not sign any concrete agreement. The party's MPs regularly supported Rama in parliament, being considered undeclared allies.

In the May 11 elections, several factors have changed at once and are thought to have an effect on the outcome, although the effect is not easily predictable. First, the Socialists won the Shkodra municipality in a landslide in the 2023 local government elections, their first victory since they changed the party name from the Labor Party to the Socialist Party thirty-five years ago. This landslide was preceded by another major change. MP Agron Çela of the SMI, who has held this position since 2013, although he is not known as an orator and is not remembered to have ever spoken in parliament, has switched to supporting the Socialist Party. Currently, Çela has decided not to run in these elections, but his daughter, Xhenis Çela, is third on the closed list for the Socialist Party. Xhenis Çela is one of the MPs who are considered already elected because the SP has never fallen below three mandates in Shkodra.

The third major change concerns Doshi, who has recently expressed his plan to be a determining force in the future parliamentary majority but at the same time, there are clear signs that the relationship between PSD and SP is not as smooth as it has been in the last four years. Doshi has expressed the objective of winning three mandates in Shkodra and, if he succeeds, he could become the force that LSI was in 2009-2017, once in coalition with DP and once in coalition with SP.

This is especially true if we look at the results of the 2021 elections. The Democratic Party won 44% of the vote in Shkodra, its best result since 2009, which gave it 5 mandates. Its ally LSI held one mandate while Doshi won two mandates. The result for the SP was disappointing, this party fell to 28% of the vote and only received 3 mandates. In short, the PSD has eroded the mandates of the Socialists and, probably, also the socialist electorate without damaging the DP much. In this context, if the votes of the LSI MP Çela exceed the SP, then the SP increases to 4 mandates, but, if you take into account the results of 2021, the DP remains the first force and with a surplus of votes, which makes the overall result in mandates, valid for the future majority, not certain for the SP.

Demographic and social profile

The Shkodra region is one of the most geographically, socially and culturally diverse areas of the country. The region's territory extends from the Adriatic coast to the Albanian Alps and includes both low and fertile areas and deep mountainous areas. The natural wealth is extraordinary, with the sea, the Drin, Buna, Kir and Gjadër rivers, Lake Shkodra and numerous mountains.

The city of Shkodra has historically been a key center for national culture, while the religious composition of the population is divided into 47% Muslims and 44% Catholics, in addition to other religions.

However, the population has declined significantly in recent decades as the non-agricultural economy has not developed sufficiently to meet the needs of the wider population for work. The population decline has affected the entire territory of the region, both rural and urban areas, towns such as Puka or Vau i Dejës, as well as the city of Shkodra itself.

The 2023 census counted 149 thousand inhabitants in the region, a 25% decrease compared to 2011 and 54% compared to 2001, the most dramatic decline recorded in the country. About 63% of the population lived in urban areas. The city of Shkodra itself has fallen to less than 62 thousand inhabitants, 20% less than in the 2011 census.

The economy of the region is diversified from coastal tourism in the Velipoja area or mountain tourism in other areas, to manufacturing in the city of Shkodra and agriculture oriented towards vegetables and melons for export in the Bushati area.

Candidates

Marjana Koçeku, an agrotourism entrepreneur, leads the Socialist Party's closed list, followed by Onid Beleri, deputy mayor and former director of the Cadastre, and Xhenis Çela, daughter of LSI MP Agron Çela. Fourth on the Socialists' closed list and the person who will likely have to improve on the Socialists' 2021 result if he wants to get a mandate is Bujar Rexha, who declares his work experience as a "guard director."

Luçiano Boçi, previously a deputy of Elbasan, leads the closed list of Democrats, followed by Kliti Hoti, a doctor and director of a foreign pharmaceutical company, current deputy Greta Bardeli, and Ramadan Likaj, the latter, former mayor of Koplik Municipality until 2015.

Former mayor of Shkodra Bardh Spahia is running from the open list position alongside ten other candidates.

Tom Doshi leads the closed list of the Social Democratic Party in the region, followed by Sabina Jorgo, director at Profarma, and Osman Teta, also director at Profarma. Profarma is a pharmaceutical company owned by Doshi./BIRN


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