Edi Rama and the SP: Spinning Their Wheels

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SUBJECT: Edi Rama and the SP: Spinning Their Wheels


1. (SBU) SUMMMARY: With 26 days to go until general elections, the
opposition Socialist Party (SP) is stuck in neutral. Lagging behind
the ruling Democratic Party (DP) in terms of money and organization,
the SP, by its own admission, is consumed with hand-wringing over
the ID card process and other election administration issues. SP
Leader Edi Rama, in keeping with past election practice, has focused
more on criticizing and threatening to disrupt the electoral process
than rolling out the SP campaign or laying out any kind of positive
SP agenda. The end result, according to numerous observers, is an
SP campaign lacking focus and unable to build momentum heading
toward the elections. It also seems clear that the SP is laying the
groundwork for a possible boycott of the electoral commissions - a
move that could paralyze the electoral process and, as the Embassy
has made very clear to the SP, would be poorly received by us and
the international community. However, it is likely that the SP
leadership itself has not yet decided on whether to take this step.
One senior SP strategist told PolOff that the odds of such a pullout
are "better than fifty percent." END SUMMARY.

Another Day, Another Ultimatum
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2. (SBU) On June 1 the SP filed a criminal lawsuit against numerous
officials in the Ministry of the Interior, charging them with intent
to conceal information regarding the issuance of ID cards. The
lawsuit comes after a stream of unmet demands by the SP for release
of more information by the MoI regarding ID card applications -
particularly applications by the voters who need IDs the most - i.e.
those who lack passports. On June 2, the SP upped the ante again,
when an SP candidate said on a morning talk show that "there will
not be elections until all Albanians who need one have an ID card."
On May 30, senior SP strategist Kastriot Islami told PolOff that the
odds of an SP withdrawal from the electoral commissions "is better
than 50 percent," but added that the decision on whether or not to
withdraw was at least one week away.


3. (SBU) According to ODIHR observers embedded in the Central
Election Commission (CEC),SP representatives on the CEC spent much
of June 1 arguing over procedural matters - including a one hour
argument over the merits of carbon copies vs. photocopies for
certain electoral documents. The SP also made a motion to mandate
bipartisan representation on vote-counting teams, as opposed to the
current law which requires only that two vote counters be present.
(NOTE: Currently, the law states that vote counting teams (the
people who will examine and count ballots on the night of the
election) consist of two people, both of whom come from a larger,
bipartisan counting center team. The law, which the SP voted to
approve as part of the electoral code, was designed to prevent one
party from shutting down the entire vote count by boycotting the
counting process. The SP motion could be seen as an attempt to ease
the way for a later SP withdrawal from the counting teams. END
NOTE)

Hand-Wringing as an Electoral Strategy
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4. (SBU) Senior SP strategist Kastriot Islami told PolOff on May 30
that he and others in the SP leadership spend 90 percent of their
time focused on the ID card process, examining voter lists, and
coming up with SP nominees for electoral commissions. Islami
admitted that this left practically no time for campaigning. Islami
and other senior SP figures told PolOff that they've been slow to
open SP campaign offices around the country, largely due to a lack
of money in comparison with the better funded Democratic Party. Two
non-SP observers told PolOff that the SP seemed to lack any kind of
positive agenda and was instead running a mainly negative campaign
centered on criticism of Prime Minister Berisha. (NOTE: To be fair,
the SP does have a long, detailed party platform, centered around
education).

Taking a Page from the SP Playbook
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5. (SBU) COMMENT: Brinksmanship and hand-wringing are tactics taken
straight from the SP playbook - a strategy used to near perfection
during the 2007 local elections, when SP concerns (legitimate
concerns, expressed in a hysterical manner) led to a crisis over IDs
that forced a one-month delay in the elections and required
international intervention to resolve. It's important to remember
that the campaign season has officially only just begun, and that
the SP still has time to find its campaign footing. Although recent
polls have tended to show the DP ahead, some polls continue to give
the SP a slim lead. It's difficult to say at this point whether SP
threats of a walkout are real or are just more SP bluster. The

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Ambassador and other EmbOffs have made plain that a boycott would be
viewed negatively by the USG and the international community in
general. Several previous SP-declared deadlines have passed with no
action. What is clear, however, is that at this point the SP seems
more focused on the electoral process than their campaign itself.