The Government and the Parliament Continue to Violate the Electoral Code

Tirana Times
By Tirana Times March 13, 2021 19:23

The Government and the Parliament Continue to Violate the Electoral Code

Voice of America has published today the results of a report from the Academy of Political Studies on the use of state resource in the electoral campaign during February, according to which the government of Albania and the parliament have approved a series of decisions which were in violation of the Electoral Code. Respectively, 5 laws, 2 government decisions and 1 decision by the Municipal Council were approved during the month of February, which will bring benefits or create easy measures for the ruling majority before the elections.

“The Electoral Code requires that 4 months before the elections, the resources and public activities of senior central and local officials have to be limited, to ensure an equal competition with the opposition,” writes VOA, adding that “the monitoring of the public activity of ministers and mayors in seven major cities of the country shows an increase in the reporting and promotion of the infrastructural investments.”

Even during the month of January, the Academy reported that at least 15 laws and decisions by the government and the parliament were in violation of the Electoral Code. According to VOA, “the observers assess them as violations of the Electoral Code, because they influence the citizens by forgiving their obligations […] through the increase of salary and pensions, new employment in the administration,” which will bring as a result electoral favoring to the political party in power. Besides the decisions which are in clear violation of the Electoral Code, the authors of the report declared to VOA that “there are also a series of electoral activities from the officials of the ruling majority, as well as the inauguration of public buildings, from which they intend to benefit politically.”

Tirana Times
By Tirana Times March 13, 2021 19:23