TIRANA, Oct 29 /ATA/ – Three main opposition Democratic Party lawmakers met with the European Parliament delegation members ahead of the EU-Albania Stabilization and Association Parliamentary Committee meeting due to be held on Tuesday and Wednesday in Tirana.
During the meeting, the opposition lawmakers, namely the Chairman of the DP parliamentary group Gazement Bardhi, MPs Jorida Tabaku and Oerd Bykykbashi, voiced concern over the current political situation, particularly focusing on the issue of parliamentary investigative committees, the electoral reform and the opposition’s demand for creation of a technical government to manage the upcoming parliamentary elections due next spring.
MP Bardhi said that the meeting with the EP delegation was taking place in a hotel, since “the parliamentary majority has punished the opposition.”
He claimed that Albanian parliament had failed to enforce the Constitutional Court ruling about the parliamentary mandate of Socialist MP Olta Xhaçka.
On her part, the Chairwoman of the Parliamentary Committee on European Affairs, Jorida Tabaku, underlined that Albania has already began the EU accession negotiations process with the first cluster on fundamentals opened recently, adding that the opposition was an actor in this process.
Tabaku said that the opposition was working on “the truths that are not always correctly written on the reports.” She claimed that the ruling Socialists dismissed the opposition’s demands for parliamentary investigative committees.
“The demand for investigative committees is turned down, because the majority is afraid. A few years ago, I chaired an inquiry committee on incinerators, which shed light into a scheme that sent many before justice, including a former deputy prime minister now wanted under an international warranty. Nine investigative committees, which are a mechanism in the hands of the opposition, have been dismissed since then,” Tabaku said.
She also accused the government of using every state means for narrow political interest following the adoption of the changes to the Electoral Code to allow diaspora to vote in Albanian elections.
According to her, the OSCE-ODIHR report notes that Prime Minister Edi Rama was using the diplomatic service to bank on the emigrants and diaspora support for the ruling Socialists in the next year’s parliamentary elections.
Opposition lawmakers insisted that creation of a technocratic administration ahead of the elections was vital.
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