New candidacies the former prime minister of the PD, who is expected to be fully backed by the party leadership, five days before the Assembly an extraordinary meeting of the PD General Committee is expected to take place to change the voting procedure for chairman of the Democratic Party so that Berisha’s candidacy for the post of chairman will be limited according to article 20 of the party statute. Berisha’s candidacy has sparked a strong debate within the PD, reflected in a motion distributed by the group of candidates for the new leadership in Farkë, where objections appear regarding the manner of his nomination. The National Council would also, through an open vote, elect the party directorate and the secretary-general, while the party chairman would emerge under a formula of senior membership proposed by the General Committee. This would be the position that Berisha himself would take at the meeting of the PD General Committee, trying to create room for negotiation for an open and fair contest, with a decision presented above all as a need to destroy an old culture and remove the compromised past from political and institutional life once and for all. Berisha, who collapsed within a few hours during the spring of 1997, proclaimed as the orator of the right who stood above and encompassed “the state as such” that would leave a mark, and whose followers remained where they were and moved forward with the easing of political depolarization, would today find himself irreplaceable in this post, until a more balanced figure could at least in these turbulent political circumstances offer a cooler hand and guarantee a normal transition. Some other candidates, insisting on the part of a large section of the party structures, would stress that Berisha could be placed under a special procedure and that, as a former prime minister and an important factor, he should be removed from the race in order to respect the party statute. However, despite everything, the PD General Committee, which is meeting today, will decide the fate of the party and Berisha’s future, entering a political battle in which moves are often made through alliances, intrigues, and also slightly by interests influenced from within. With this negotiated composition, it seems that Berisha, even in the absence of a series of open votes for such a post, will try to preserve a consensus, albeit not a complete one, for his future leadership at the head of the party. Everything depends on the Committee vote, which is expected to enter an important phase for the PD, which is trying to create a more democratic structure, with a formula that avoids centralized elections and may result in a party more open to internal debate and more united on the eve of electoral challenges.