Friday, May 15th 2026
The failure to elect a new head of state in Kosovo added to the institutional instability in the country this year, prompting new parliamentary elections after a lost year in 2025.
And this instability may deepen in the absence of clear candidates for the post of president, and the unwillingness of political parties to make concessions.
Despite not being directly elected by the citizens, could it be eased? the appointment of a new president if the parties present a candidate before the early elections of June 7?
Which parties have presented a candidate for president?
Only the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK) in the opposition has announced that the bearer of its electoral list, Vjosa Osmani, as part of a pre-election cooperation, will be its candidate for president.
Osmani seeks a second term at the head of the state, after failing to run again in April.
Other major parties, such as the ruling Vetëvendosje Movement (LVV) and the main opposition party, the Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK), have not presented candidates.
While the parties are not obliged to present any candidate for president before the elections, they should at least commit to the characteristics of the presidential candidate’s profile, or to the principles that they will lead in reaching a political consensus, says Agon Maliqi, an expert on political issues in Kosovo.
“They must clarify the circumstances in which they would agree on a president, and what characteristics that president should have, in order to avoid elections again. Based on this commitment, they can then be held accountable after the elections”, says Maliqi for Radon Evropa e Lire (REL).
In practice, this will to mean more political transparency before the elections and less improvisation after them.
Neither the ruling party of the acting prime minister, Albin Kurti, nor the PDK answered REL’s questions about whether they will announce any of their candidates for the next president of Kosovo.
Maliqi believes that the LDK presented the candidate due to the “specific circumstances” of former president Osmani, while the other parties are not they do it because they don’t have a clear candidate, and they don’t even feel the urgency to do it now.
“I think that the LDK did it, probably, out of the conviction that the narrative of its victimization by Kurti can arouse emotions in a type of voter, who in December voted for the LVV because of the Kurti-Osmani binomial, and not only for Kurti,” he explains. Maliqi.
Even if there were candidacies now, according to Maliqi, they could look “artificial”.
He argues that especially when it comes to the president – if not also for other positions – there will be a need for concessions between the parties.
Because the election of the president in Kosovo is rarely a process that is decided by the electoral result – it usually requires political agreements, compromises and concessions between the parties.
Exactly here. lies the main problem: the parties are entering the elections without any minimum agreement on the position that can determine the institutional stability of the country for the coming years.
Kosovo has suffered from the lack of compromises between the parties in recent years and the election of the president at this time seems not so easy a task.
The country lost the entire year 2025 as a result of the failure to establish the Assembly first, and then the Government, in the absence of consensus – and the elections are being held again within a short time, due to disagreements about the president, without any guarantee of what will happen next.
The LVV, in power since 2021, is again seen as the favorite to win the elections, but it is not expected to get 80 seats in the 120-member Assembly.
For the vote for the president of Kosovo to be valid, the presence of 2/3 of all deputies in the Assembly.
Ehat Miftaraj, from the Kosovo Institute for Justice, says that Kosovo is missing a real political debate between the position and the opposition on strategic state topics, including the issue of the president.
“In this aspect, the election of the president in Kosovo should be seen as a process that requires political communication, democratic compromise, and transparency towards the public, and not as an issue that is addressed through wish lists or imposition”, he emphasizes Miftaraj.
For all the institutional crises within a year and a half, the ruling party and those in the opposition have blamed each other.
In the end, the next president may not be determined by the names that the parties announce before the elections, but by their willingness to compromise when they face the parliamentary reality after June 7.
Until the election of the president, Albulena Haxhiu will continue to exercise the function, the task whose six-month term lasts until October at the latest.
Source: prizrenpost
Etiketa: Brief
