TIRANA, Albania: Parliament on Friday elected Bamir Topi, deputy leader of the governing Democratic Party, as Albania's new president, after some opposition lawmakers broke their coalition's boycott and took part in the vote.Topi, 50, a biologist by profession and father of two, replaces President Alfred Moisiu, elected five years ago with a rare consensus between the two ever-bickering political groupings and whose term expires Tuesday.
Lawmakers cast 85 votes for Topi on Friday, one more than required in the 140-seat Parliament to elect a president in Albania.
Several opposition lawmakers broke rank with their own coalition to join the 80-member governing coalition in the vote.
"I will be the president of all Albanians... I will give my best for Albania's integration into the European Union and NATO," Topi told AFP after the vote.
6 comments:
Topi is just another pawn of Berisha's, another CRONIE in a corrupt and inept political system!
Let's not be fooled, as long as Ramiz Alia, Berisha, Nano & Co. are in the political scene of Albania, this country will remain in the shadows of Enver Hoxha and the stench of Stalinist communism.
Call teh parties what you want, Democrats, Socialists, etc., they are all teh same ...
ALBANIAN SHOULD BE EMBARRASED!!
THIS COUNTRY DOES NOT EVEN KNOW WHAT THE ROLE OF PRESIDENT SHOULD BE.
AS KOSOVA MOVES FORWARD AND IS DEVELOPING INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS, ALBANIA IS MOVING BACKWARDS ...
THERE IS TALK ABOUT A GREATER ALBANIA ... FEAR NOT WORLD, BECAUSE I DON'T THINK KOSOVA WOULD WANT TO STEP BACK IN THEIR PROGRESS IN JOINING ALBANIA, KOSOVA WILL ENTER THE EUROPEAN UNION, ETC. BEFORE ALBANIA.
I concur -- those old CRONIES you mention are the cancer that is putting Albania to its death.
All things aside, Albania's obstacles are its political leaders. How soon people forget that is was under Berisha's regime that 1997 led to a total collpase with no rememdy to put the country back on its feet.
Fatos Nano has a laundry list of political corruption, and during the late 90s he was about to be indicted on charges by Albania's highest court, but he side-stepped that by ordering the arrest of the Supreme Justice (Zef Brozi -- who eventually escaped Albania for the USA).
And yes, good ol' Ramiz Alia. What else can we possibly expect from a man who was Hoxha's right hand cronie? He witnessed the execution of thosands of Albanians during Hoxha's rule, and ordered the same himself. He was and still is a pure Stalinist, a pure demagogue, a pure athiest, and a pure enemy of democratic theory and transition.
As long as these people are alive, Albania will continue to stumble and not progress. The political system is so rigged that no other credible candidate can make his/her way up the system and into a position to be a legitimate candidate.
The citizens of Albania know this, but they are hopeless. Whom to trust?? The name Sigurimi still echos everywhere.
Another revolution (1990) may not be out of the question.
...Reactions to Friday's vote were mixed. Socialist Parliamentary Group leader Ben Blushi resigned, after six members of his group voted for Topi. Blushi told reporters that Topi was elected after a shameful process.
Socialist Party leader Edi Rama, who had been pushing for early elections, accused the majority of corruption of votes and said the Socialists will not attend the session parliament at which Topi will take the presidential oath.
"I would have liked to congratulate the new president, but he doesn't deserve the Socialist Party's congrats … because he is a direct contributor to this shameful process of corruption," Rama said.
In the first two rounds of voting, Topi and Nano were the candidates, but neither could gather the necessary votes, as the opposition boycotted the process. In the third round, a new candidate -- centrist Democratic Alliance Party member Neritan Ceka -- joined the race, supported by signatures of 20 members of parliament.
Nano came in third in the third round, and was therefore eliminated from running in Friday's election. On Friday, Topi managed to get the necessary votes, while Ceka received five votes.
The election of the president closed one of the most serious political crises the country has faced to date. The constitution mandates early election if parliament fails to elect the president after five rounds. As Moisiu's term ends Tuesday, early elections would have been the next step.
Its funny how no one in this forum is congratulating Topi.
I agree that the presidential elections were a sham in Albania, and just to think that Parliament almost dissolved, kuku.
As in many parlkiamentary systems, the presidnet is just a figure-head where the real power is wielded by the PM.
And that is where the real problem lies in Albania!
Albania is stuck on REVERSE!
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