There will be a lot of articles, comments, opinions and analyses about the tent that the opposition set up after its protest on 18 February. Most of them struggle to offer reasons, to guess, accuse, abuse or deform, to make diversions or misinform about the true reasons of the opposition’s tent.
I must stress that the tent has nothing to do with the New Republic or the Old Republic and even with the current one. It has nothing to do with the boycott of the elections or the registration or of the opposition in the Central Election Commission. It has nothing to do with electronic voting either, with cannabisation of the country or with the promised public works of this government. It also has nothing to do with the opposition’s action or parliamentary boycott from parliamentary opposition’s parties. But above all, it has nothing to do with the technocrat government, the government’s technocrats or the opposition’s technocrats’ who want to seize power on the table. No.
For those who take it seriously, the tent seems like a border, an orientation point for the relations that Albania has with the present, but above all, with the future. Sali Berisha is very clear and sincere when he expresses himself against the Vetting and this judicial reform from the opposition’s tent. Therefore, he has nothing to hide. The problem relates to the leader of DP, Lulzim Basha, who for the first time since he became the “de jure” leader of the DP, publicly articulates a completely different reason from the “de facto” leader for the same political action. And as a result, for the stay in the tent too. This reason is: Free and fair elections on 18 June! These two different reasons seem to be the cause why Berisha and Basha are not seen together in the tent. And this is also the first time that they are not afraid of publicly showing this difference that exists between them.
It seems that Sali Berisha sees 18 June as an opportunity and Lulzim Basha as hope. The former as a threshold to extend his past, while the latter as a date to speed up his political future. A future which cannot be insured, if Basha doesn’t show in the first campaign of a general election that he leads, that he has also become the “de facto” leader of the Democratic Party. As a result, he must show that he will be the “de facto” leader of the opposition and a “de facto” candidate for the post of the future Prime Minister of Albania. And for this, he needs the tent so much.
But we must understand him. We must believe him. We must help him to continue and remain in that tent for a little longer, because during these days, within that tent, he seems to feel and enjoy for the first time in four years being a “de facto” leader of the DP. Leader of the opposition. A possible alternative of power. A candidate for the post of Prime Minister. A Polar Star for the media and the international community that come and go in Tirana. This is a great leap for him, because after he was elected leader of DP, he has been out of Parliament. Out of those premises where the true political debate takes place. Away of that podium, which is the main and real podium of the opposition in every democratic country. During these four years, he has seen Sali Berisha and all other democrat MPs from the TV screen. Alone in his office, forgotten, a few meters away from those premises where there’s debate, noise, insults and where laws are produced, with or without consensus.
He seems to enjoy in these four weeks what he was denied in four years, because for the first time, all of those that he once watched on TV, are coming to see him. They come in the tent every day. They sit around him and listen to him, applaud him and adore only him. Even those who have never set foot or rarely come in the tent, watch him LIVE on TV. Even when they don’t agree with him, they continue to watch him. Because nobody from those who spoke in parliament for four years, is speaking now in that tent. Now it’s his turn to speak and it’s their turn to listen to him from that tent or their TV sets. Only him. Sometimes Berisha. And then him again.
All the democrat MPs, all the leaders of the allied parties, all of those whom he has seen for four years in a row from his office, watch him on TV now, in front of the microphones, in political TV shows, portals and on the front pages of newspapers. He has now realized that that place in the boulevard is the only place for him to fulfill his political dreams. Let him enjoy it. Let him get excited. We must all understand Lulzim Basha, because once he leaves that tent, all of this experience will be a thing of the past.
