Who will administer the elections?

For the first time, the Socialist Party has discovered a general idea on how the general administration should be. The first discussion matter should be that of how to find a depoliticized managing group that is led by public employees.

“It is very simple to find depoliticized models that other countries have, but the first question that we must address to ourselves is if we have a depoliticized society and the second, if do we have a depoliticized public administration. I really want to have a permanent election administration group, which would be perfect in Albania’s condition, with people that fear the law, but unfortunately, we know that there are cases when people have been caught red handed and there has been no punishment”, declared the Socialist MP, Damian Gjiknuri.

Which is the concept of the opposition on how this problem can be solved, in order to liberate the process by the absolute effect of political parties in the elections?

“We want to liberate the lower electoral administration levels by the decision-making. They must have decisions of the standard character, with standard procedures. They must not have decision-making authority, as it happened at the Municipal Unit 5, where they closed the result with an order received by phone. It has happened in other countries, it might have happened from the political force to which I belong, but this decision making should be removed”, Gjiknuri declared.

Besides the administration in second and third electoral level, the Achilles’ heel is the discussion for the formation and competencies of the Central Election Commission. The Socialist co-chairman of the Central Election Commission, Damian Gjiknuri, admits that the opposition has not been able to process a final idea over this point, due to the important competences that has the highest peak of the election pyramid, which, according to the opposition, created grave problems in the last elections by affecting the result of the Tirana Municipality.

But the former Chairman of the Central Election Commission, Clirim Gjata, gave a clearer idea. He sees the biggest problem not at the CEC, but at the political protection that the parties give to the commissioners and their vote counters. According to him, the best solution is to remove the political protection for the Commissioners and reducing the CEC competencies.

“The matter is that we have 5000 voting center commissions, counting groups, zonal commissions etc, and each of them acts as a separate CEC. When they take an order by the respective candidate or the running party, they don’t feel any more accountable to the law and the administrative hierarchy. This is where the reform should start. CEC is that last institution that could resolve this matter. CEC should be responsible only for the electoral preparations. The Complaints shouldn’t be made any more at CEC and the problem is solved. The complaints should go to courts”, Gjata declared.

So far there is no written amend proposed by the parties, and the majority’s concept remains unknown for the managing of the elections.  The parties will present their opinions by the end of March, when the Commission for the Electoral Reform will discuss together with the ODIHR experts about the models, the competences and the rights that the administrators and the political parties will have for the political process.

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