Storm at the Ministry of the Interior
Another 5 thousand dollars from the foundations go missing. Customs has robbed the state
The DP is coming ...
After Bushati, the DP arrives in Parliament today. Yesterday, Bushati’s swearing-in ceremony resembled a brief stage rehearsal, which suggests that the Christian Democrat handled it successfully. In a way, Bushati was the herald of the DP’s arrival in the parliamentary chamber. For the first time, a diminished Berisha keeps his word; he had said that without Laco and Bushati he would not take a step toward the Assembly chamber. And for the first time he keeps his word with his allies. Not only that, but so that the Christian Democrat Zef’s ceremony would stand out, the DP did not go to Parliament yesterday; otherwise, the barely arrived leader of the Christian Democrats would have faded into the background. Today Berisha will be sworn in with Azem Hajdari, without Ali Spahiu. But how will the mixed group of the “përdëlljestëve” and its three guests enter Parliament? As victors, as troublemakers, as resentful people, or as a constructive opposition? However they enter, they are now the opposition, and they are welcome to the right wing. However, a small detail needs to be clarified here: the DP is not the only opposition; the DBSH is one too. The DP is at fault toward the latter. Not only because it has shown great hostility toward the DBSH, but also because, with feminine naivety, it blames this fragile political formation for its crushing defeat in the contest with the left. In this defeat, the DP bears the greater share of the blame, since it has never respected the genuine Albanian right. Will the DP cooperate with the deputies of the United Right? It is its right to decide, but the DP group, and especially its de facto leader, owes the DBSH a great deal. It was Berisha’s political order that prevented the DBSH from forming a parliamentary group. The epaulette-less general of the Constitutional Court, Rustem Gjata, followed the doctor’s prescription to the letter in refusing to recognize the mandate of the PR (and, at the same time, DBSH) deputy Fatmir Mediu. As a result, the DBSH was left without a parliamentary group, fulfilling Berisha’s wish to be the center of the opposition. Asked last night about the DP parliamentary group’s arrival in Parliament, PR Chairman Sabri Godo commented: “We welcome the DP parliamentary group, expressing the hope that Parliament will now be able to breathe freely. Until now, Parliament has been going down a dead-end road. The PS majority has stifled the opposition. More than once, the Socialists have struck ridiculous poses, even determining how far the opposition should be allowed to go. Indeed, these efforts by Majko or someone else have made Parliament look like one enormous insult. If this mentality continues, Parliament will not proceed along the right path.” In Godo’s statement and those of other United Right deputies, the DP group’s arrival in Parliament is seen as a hope for putting its internal relations in order. We hope that from now on the DP will know how to deal with the other wing of the opposition as well. Let us hope that the Democrats will not merely be troublemakers in Parliament, but a constructive opposition working for Albania’s good.
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