According to almost complete voting crimes, the ruling Socialist Party of Albania won the country's parliamentary elections, ensuring a fourth term before Prime Minister Edi Rama's tenure.
About 96% of the votes were counted, and official results showed on Tuesday that the Socialist Party won 82 seats in the 140-seat parliament, with 52% of the votes earning seats.
The opposition center-right Democrats won 51 seats with 34% of the vote. The other three small parties will occupy the rest of the seats.
The threshold for participating in the Albanian Congress is one percent of the party, while the party coalition is five percent.
Full results are expected later Tuesday. If confirmed, the result will be compared to the last election, Rama's party won 49% of the vote and will give him a majority to form the government.
Delays may
The Central Election Commission for Elections said that according to law, the final result will appear 48 hours after the voting is over.
As the opposition demanded that about 53,000 votes mailed from expats in neighboring Greece would not be considered, the results could be delayed, claiming they were manipulated.
The first time people among the diaspora can vote. About 195,000 were mailed.
Qualified voters in Albania and abroad vote to elect 140 parliamentarians on the four-year mission of the Balkan nation. Due to mass immigration, a country with 2.4 million people has nearly 3.7 million qualified voters.
The expat vote from Greece could transfer multiple seats in three to four regions to support the ruling party. The opposition claimed that they were manipulated by socialist supporters. The postal company said it has a confirmed signature from all Greek voters.
Rama has been in power since 2013, with his campaign focused on efforts to gain membership in the EU by 2030. Sali Berisha, a candidate for the conservative Democratic Party, argued that Albania is still not ready for the group's membership.
Some analysts were surprised by Rama's success, hoping that a series of corruption scandals and recent unrest would affect his achievements due to the crackdown on the opposition.
A common international observation mandate states that despite its competitive and professional management, the electoral process to date is characterized by the abuse of public resources by the ruling party, an adversarial and polarized tone, the two major parties using disagreement language, non-transparent financing, and an imbalance in media coverage of smaller parties.