Kurti, Abdixhiku Meet Without Deal, Sejdiu Drops to 74

Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti and the leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), Lumir Abdixhiku, met on September 2 in the Kosovo Assembly and talked for nearly two hours, but the meeting ended without a deal on Bekim Sejdiu’s candidacy for president. Support for the joint candidate, which stood at 80 votes at the outset, has fallen to no more than 74, after six of the LDK’s 18 lawmakers announced they would not vote for him.

Electing Kosovo’s president in the first two rounds requires a two-thirds majority, meaning 80 of the Assembly’s 120 lawmakers must be present. Only in a third round, under a 2011 Constitutional Court ruling, does a simple 61-vote majority suffice. Without those 80 lawmakers in the chamber, the vote cannot even open, which puts the opposition, despite being a numerical minority, in a position to block the entire process.

The understanding between the Self-Determination Movement and the LDK on a joint candidate took shape over August. On August 13, Abdixhiku announced that the LDK was dropping its demands for posts in government and that the party was ready to help elect a nonpartisan president. After the two leaders met on August 18, both sides confirmed there was a will to reach a deal and that they wanted to avoid new elections, and on August 26 they discussed specific names for the first time. Bekim Sejdiu’s name was agreed on August 31, the same day he accepted the candidacy.

A Revolt Inside the LDK, the Same Day Its Leadership Backed Him

The LDK presidency unanimously backed Sejdiu’s candidacy on September 1. That same day, six of the party’s lawmakers announced they would not vote for him: Hikmete Bajrami, Avdulah Hoti, Kujtim Shala, Arben Gashi, Armend Zemaj and Janina Imeri. The September 2 meeting between Kurti and Abdixhiku came only after that revolt, as an attempt to overcome the crisis rather than its trigger.

Lawmaker Imeri said after her parliamentary group’s meeting, in comments to the Nacionale portal, that one of the six lawmakers who opposed the candidacy had asked Abdixhiku to let him hand back his party mandate, and that the LDK leader had refused. According to her, Abdixhiku then, the moment he left that meeting, asked the lawmakers himself to hand back their mandates.

“This is a form of hypocrisy. One of the lawmakers who objected yesterday asked him whether he would take the mandate back, and he told him he wouldn’t. The moment he walked out, he said they should hand back their mandates,” Imeri said.

Kurti did not speak to the media after the meeting with Abdixhiku in the Assembly. He had laid out his view of the crisis somewhat earlier, in an interview for the French podcast “Quartier Général,” where he described the opposition as small in number but strong enough to block a quorum.

“We keep winning elections. I’d like not to win so often, less often would be better,” Kurti said, noting that Kosovo has held three election cycles in under a year and a half. He added that he intends to talk with opposition parties and ask them for proposals on a way out of the situation: “I plan to engage with them constructively and see if they have any proposals for a way forward. Because so far, we’ve been the only ones proposing various solutions, and each time our proposals have run into opposition rejection.”

After the meeting in the Assembly, Abdixhiku said talks with Self-Determination would continue, but without illusions about the numbers.

“We will try to keep meeting, but the numerical situation in the Kosovo Assembly is what it is,” Abdixhiku said, adding that he and Kurti had briefed each other during the meeting on what was happening inside their own parties. Asked what comes next, he said that question should be put to “those who decided to push Kosovo into an unclear phase,” and said the political fight over the government should be waged over the government, while the question of the president should be resolved in the Assembly.

LDK: Self-Determination Departs From Its Go-It-Alone Approach for the First Time

The day after the meeting, on September 3, Abdixhiku laid out the broader context of the talks on the “Adresa” program on Kanal 10, in comments carried by Ekonomia Online. He said the LDK, besides its talks with Self-Determination, had also held meetings with the Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) and the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo (AAK), but that at one point it became clear the PDK did not want to be part of the process of electing a president.

“We also had meetings with other parties, with the PDK and the Alliance. At one stage we realized the PDK would not be part of the process. We also asked about the Alliance’s six demands,” Abdixhiku said.

He also said the ruling movement was, for the first time in two years, departing from its usual way of negotiating.

“This is the first time in the past two years that the Self-Determination Movement has stepped back from its position, moving from a go-it-alone approach to a consensus-based process. That wasn’t the case in the talks after December,” Abdixhiku said, adding that the LDK sees itself as an institutionalist party. “We are an institutionalist party. In our first meetings we talked about democratic balance. During the campaign and after it, we had a clear political orientation. As the party’s highest body, we adopted, on my proposal, a declaration that the LDK is committed to forming institutions.”

Srpske vesti reported earlier on how the revolt by six LDK lawmakers pushed Kosovo toward fresh uncertainty over the election of a president. The September 2 meeting did not resolve that uncertainty, it only confirmed it officially at the highest level. Kurti still insists the political agreement on Sejdiu stands, Abdixhiku speaks of a “numerically impossible situation,” and neither side has yet said when a vote in the Assembly might even be scheduled.