Nearly full vote count shows that the Socialist Party won 52% of the vote or 82% of the 140 seats.
Albania’s ruling Socialist Party has secured an unprecedented fourth term in which Prime Minister Eddie Rama took office, winning the country’s parliamentary elections, according to almost complete vote counts.
With around 96% of the vote counted, official results on Tuesday showed that the Socialist Party won 82 seats in the 140-seat parliament and 52% of the votes.
Opposition Central Right Democrats secured 51 seats with 34% of the votes. A small party of three other people takes the rest.
The threshold for Albania’s entry into parliament is 1% for parties and 5% for party alliances.
The full results are expected later on Tuesday. If confirmed, the result is an increase from the last election in which the Lama party won 49% of the vote and gave a majority to form the government.
Possible delays
The Central Election Commission, the election commission, says the law will result in the final results 48 hours after the vote is over.
The results could be delayed in response to opposition requests to not consider the roughly 53,000 votes mailed by the neighbouring Greek diaspora, claiming they are being manipulated.
For the first time, people in the diaspora were able to cast their mail order. Approximately 195,000 votes were mailed.
Eligible voters in Albania and abroad have voted to elect 140 lawmakers for their four-year mission in the Balkans. Due to the large immigration, the 2.4 million country has a total of nearly 3.7 million voters.
Diaspora votes from Greece could move many seats to three or four regions in favor of the ruling party. Opposition parties argue that they were manipulated by supporters of socialism. The postal company said it has confirmed signatures of all Greek voters.
Rama, who had been in power since 2013, focused on working to acquire membership in the European Union by 2030. Conservative Democratic candidate Sari Belisha has argued that Albania is not yet ready for membership in the bloc.
Some analysts were surprised by the strength of Rama’s success, hoping that a string of corruption scandals due to opposition crackdowns and recent domestic unrest will affect his outcomes.
The Joint International Observation Mission noted that despite being competitive and professionally controlled, the election process to date was characterized by misuse of public resources in the ruling party, conflicting and polarized tones, two major political parties using schismal language, untransparent fundraising, and disproportionate media coverage of small parties.
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