Sali Ram Berisha is an Albanian cardiologist and conservative politician who served as the president of Albania from 1992 to 1997 and as the 32nd prime minister of Albania from 2005 to 2013. Berisha has served as Chairman of the Democratic Party of Albania since 2022. He has previously held the position of Chairman from 1990 to 1992 and 1997 to 2013. He is the leader of opposition in Albania.
Edi Rama is an Albanian politician and painter who has been serving as the 33rd and incumbent prime minister of Albania since 2013 and chairman of the Socialist Party of Albania since 2005. He was Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports from 1998 to 2000. First elected mayor of Tirana in 2000, he was reelected in 2003 and 2007.
The Democratic Party of Albania is a conservative political party in Albania. It has been the largest opposition party in the country since 2013.
Lulzim Basha is an Albanian lawyer and former politician who served as chairman of the Democratic Party of Albania and as the Leader of the Opposition from 2013 to 2022 and again from 2023 until 2024.
In 1991, the Socialist Party of Albania, with specific social democratic ideology took control of the country through democratic elections. One year later the Democratic Party of Albania won the new elections. After 1990, Albania has been seeking a closer relationship with the West. What followed were deliberate programs of economic and democratic reform, but the implementation of capitalism led to the proliferation of pyramid schemes. Chaos in late 1996 to early 1997, as a result of the collapse of these pyramid schemes, alarmed the world and prompted the influx of international peacekeeping forces. In 1995, Albania was accepted into the Council of Europe and requested membership in NATO and is a potential candidate country for accession to the European Union. The workforce of Albania has continued to emigrate to Western countries, especially Greece and Italy.
Bujar Faik Nishani was an Albanian politician. He served as the president of Albania from 24 July 2012 to 24 July 2017.
The 2011 Albanian opposition demonstrations were a series of anti-government protests in cities around Albania following 18 months of political conflict over alleged electoral fraud by the opposition. A video surfaced which portrayed the deputy prime minister arranging a corrupt deal with the minister of economy. The public outcry over the video resulted in the resignation of the deputy prime minister, Ilir Meta. A demonstration was called by parliamentary opposition parties, which include the Socialist Party and the Unity for Human Rights Party. These were called on 21 January in order to protest the alleged corruption of the Albanian government as well as widespread unemployment and poverty in the country.
The Albanian local elections of 2011 took place on 8 May 2011 in Albania. Electors were asked to elect their municipality's mayor, municipal council members, municipal unit mayor, and municipal unit members. The elections were administrated by the Central Election Commission of Albania. Only 9 of the 384 winning candidates were women.
Saimir Tahiri is a convicted Albanian politician, who served as the Minister of Interior Affairs in the government of Prime Minister Edi Rama from 2013 to 2017.
Local elections were held in Albania on 21 June 2015. Voters elected mayors, municipal council members, municipal unit mayors and municipal unit members. The Central Election Commission of Albania was responsible for administrating the elections. This provided that the community type of komuna was abolished and at the same time the total number of communities were reduced from 373 to 61 Bashkia. Those entitled to vote elected the executive and legislative representatives of their communities, the 61 mayors (and on the other hand the total of 1595 municipal councils.
Erion Veliaj is an Albanian politician currently serving as the Mayor of Tirana. Stemming from a civil society activism organization as the leader of MJAFT!, Veliaj joined the ranks of the Socialist Party of Albania in 2011, when he was appointed Secretary for Youth and Immigration.
Parliamentary elections were held in Albania on 25 June. They had initially been scheduled for 18 June, but after a possible boycott was announced by opposition parties during a political crisis that lasted three months, an agreement was reached between all parties on 18 May to change the date. The Socialist Party won 74 of the 140 seats.
The following lists events in the year 2017 in Albania.
Rudina Hajdari is an Albanian politician, formerly serving as a member of the Assembly of the Republic of Albania. Daughter of the late Azem Hajdari, who led the 1990–1991 student movement which brought about the collapse of communism in Albania, Hajdari was elected to Albania's assembly on 9 September 2017, representing an area of the country's capital city, Tirana.
The 2018–2019 student protests in Albania were a series of street protests, demonstrations and online activism events held by the students of the public universities from December 2018 until February 2019, to oppose the high tuition fees. Students across Albania rallied against the moves that were made by the Albanian government to increase the cost of university education, by introducing new fees for exams. The fee comes on top of the dramatically risen university fees, which have failed to lead to any improvement in public education.
The Alliance for Serbia was an opposition alliance of political parties in Serbia that was founded in September 2018. The alliance boycotted the 2020 parliamentary election, due to claims that the elections would not be held under fair conditions. The alliance officially dissolved in August 2020, as the new alliance called United Opposition of Serbia was formed.
Starting from 16 February 2019, the opposition parties organized a series of protests and rallies against the government to demand new elections and the formation of a technocrat government that would ensure the fairness of the electoral process, citing electoral fraud and corruption in the government as the main reasons for the need for change.
Parliamentary elections were held in Albania on 25 April 2021 amid the COVID-19 pandemic to elect the 140 members of parliament. A total of 1,871 candidates, including 732 women, were registered, with ten political parties, two coalitions and three independent candidates contesting the election. The Socialist Party (PS), led by incumbent Prime Minister Edi Rama, opted for an independent participation, while the opposition Democratic Party (PD), under Lulzim Basha, formed the Democratic Party – Alliance for Change, a coalition with 12 smaller parties. Other notable political entities, including the Socialist Movement for Integration (LSI) and the Social Democratic Party (PSD), also pursued electoral success independently. The election campaign was highly polarised, with competing narratives centered on pressing national issues such as European Union (EU) accession, economic development, healthcare reform, infrastructure modernisation, and the government's handling of the COVID-19 crisis. Campaign strategies were significantly altered due to the pandemic, with political parties increasingly relying on digital platforms and social media to reach voters, as traditional in-person events were limited by public health restrictions.
The 2019 Albanian protests were demonstrations and protests led by the opposition, between February and June 2019, calling for the cancellation of the 2019 Albanian local elections, fresh elections, the resignation of prime minister Edi Rama and his entire cabinet and the installation of a new technocratic government.
Local elections were held on 14 May 2023 in Albania. Mayors and municipal council seats were being elected in each of Albania's 61 municipalities.
