TIRANA, October 5/ATA/ The Chairperson of the Parliamentary Group of the Socialist Party Taulant Balla stressed today that, “If the amendments to the Electoral Code today did not get a constitutional majority beyond 94 votes, one can say that they are not consensual.”But, as long as this Assembly gave today to these changes in the Code a majority beyond 94 votes, this shows that these changes are consensual within the space of the Parliament”.
In his speech in the Parliament, Balla said that, “It is not at all true that the lists are not open at all. I was on top of the list of Elbasan in 2017, I may be first on the list of Elbasan in 2021, but I can come to the bottom of the list if the honorable people of Elbasan do not give me their votes. How is it possible to say that the list is not open when every of the candidates can be the first ranked by the party and can come out the last from the ranking made by the people. Everyone of the 14 candidates in Elbasan is part of the preferential vote.”
“For the sake of our readiness for consensus, our readiness to find the spirit and space for the best possible elections, we have made a concession to you. Due to the consensus with you here and to be honest even with a small extra-Parliamentary party through you we raised the electoral threshold to 1%. The 1% threshold is not found in any country because in unitary countries like Albania a threshold of not less than 3% must always be applied “, – underlined Balla.
The head of the socialist Parliamentary group said that, “We made this omission, as well as the other omission for the chairman of the party to run in four constituencies. This is also something we think is worth considering as a concession to small parties.”/k.s/j.p/p.s./
