Kosovo, heading towards a fragile government

The new parliament of Kosovo, which emerged from the February 9 elections, will meet next week: despite their victory, Albin Kurti and Vetëvendosje will not have an easy time forming a new government

On April 15, the deputies elected in the general elections held on February 9 in Kosovo will take their seats in Parliament. This date was set by President Vjosa Osmani for the constitution of the new Kosovar legislature.

Until then, the winning party of the elections, Lëvizja Vetëvendosje (LVV), has less than a week to secure a parliamentary majority to first elect the Speaker of Parliament and then to form the government.

The Speaker of Parliament must be proposed by LVV.
As the winning party, Vetëvendosje secured 48 seats in the Assembly, but this is not enough to elect the new Speaker and Deputy Speakers of the Parliament, nor to form a government, which requires at least 61 votes.

If the party of acting Prime Minister Albin Kurti continues to struggle to secure a majority, Eugen Cakolli from the Kosova Democratic Institute (KDI) anticipates delays in forming new institutions.

“In this situation, the biggest problem will be Vetëvendosje itself, which, if it fails to secure the necessary votes to elect the Speaker of Parliament with a new majority, I don't believe will propose a candidate at all, because that would start the final legal deadline of 15 days for forming a new government,” Cakolli said.

During next Tuesday’s constitutive session surprises are not expected, says Arbresha Loxha, Executive Director of the Group for Legal and Political Studies (GLPS).

“This is because there have already been signs that Vetëvendosje is in talks with individual MPs and may have secured the necessary 61 votes. On the other hand, anything I might say could be speculation. The real issue is political immaturity. Everyone should be showing political maturity and swiftly forming the country's institutions because global changes won’t wait for us,” Loxha states.

Members of the outgoing cabinet who were elected as MPs did not resign before the certification of election results, as required by the Law on Government. Therefore, questions have been raised about whether their mandates might be contested in the parliamentary constitution session, Cakolli from KDI notes.

“The Mandate Verification Commission must genuinely and substantively examine the validity of the mandates of MPs who attend that day’s session. I believe that the mandates of cabinet members who haven’t resigned are incompatible with both the Rules of Procedure regarding the rights and responsibilities of MPs, and with the Constitution itself,” emphasises Cakolli.

Loxha from GLPS shares the same assessment.

The winner’s consultations

Immediately after the constitutive session of the Assembly was called, LVV leader Albin Kurti began consultations with non-Serb minority political parties about forming the government.

Most of them had cooperated with Kurti during his four-year term, but this time not all have promised their support for forming a new government.

Some community representatives have presented various demands in exchange for their votes.

A few days after these consultations came to a conclusion, the Kosovo Security Council said that Serbia is interfering with some non-majority and non-Serb MPs in an effort to sabotage the formation of new institutions in the ninth Kosovo legislature.

Turning to the opposition

In addition to the votes of non-Serb minority MPs, Kurti also needs support from Albanian opposition parties. Specifically, he needs the votes of three MPs from the “Social Democratic Initiative” party led by Fatmir Limaj, who has expressed willingness — allegedly in the interest of the state — to support the formation of a government.

At least one meeting between the two leaders was held recently, according to OBCT sources, although neither party has officially confirmed it.

Despite initially rejecting the possibility of collaborating with the opposition to form a government, Kurti now appears to be moving in the opposite direction.

He has invited the leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), Lumir Abdixhiku, for consultations on forming institutions. However, officials from LDK, which placed third in the elections, have implied that they will not accept the invitation.

Eventually, Abdixhiku declined Albin Kurti’s invitation for consultations regarding the formation of the government, accusing Vetëvendosje of using divisive, offensive, and labeling language toward the LDK, its members, and its voters over the years.

"A fragile government without the opposition"

Civil society members do not rule out the possibility that a 61-vote majority could be secured with the support of non-majority communities and selected MPs from other parties.

However, they believe that excluding major opposition parties would lead to the formation of a fragile government, which, according to Eugen Cakolli, would make it difficult to achieve broader consensus on important processes for Kosovo, such as dialogue with Serbia and relations with the United States.

“A broad-based government is necessary for Kosovo. The government should serve the purpose of managing extremely important processes ahead, which, in terms of civic legitimacy, shouldn't exclude half the electorate. That kind of exclusion creates deep political division and polarisation, which inevitably reflects in society,” Cakolli adds.

Besides the unfavourable global context, a broad-consensus government, according to Arbresha Loxha, is also necessary to ensure that its mandate does not end prematurely next April, when a new President must be elected.

“Such a government would naturally be fragile and would not provide any real stability for the Republic of Kosovo. In this geopolitical context, we believe that’s not good for Kosovo, because the main test for this government will be when it has to elect the new President. Without a stable coalition, that’s going to be difficult. Then, it would need to include the two parties that won the most votes, to ensure a government with enough numbers to also elect the new President,” Loxha says.

Both Loxha and Cakolli assess that the inability to complete the electoral process in a timely manner not only negatively impacts security, the economy, and citizens' well-being, but also damages Kosovo’s image as a young democracy.