The government-backed candidate in Himare, Albania, is set to replace the previous mayor ethnic Greek Fredi Beleris, after Sunday’s election.
Socialist Party candidate Vangjel Tavo was leading in the repeat mayoral election. According to preliminary results at the Central Election Commission Tavo won 58.62 percent, while 41.38 percent went to Petraq Gjikuria from the Together We Win 10-party coalition with 63 percent of the vote counted from 28 out of 36 polling stations.
The vote was held after Beleris, a member of the country’s ethnic Greek minority, was stripped of his title, convicted, and jailed on vote-buying charges. Both Beleris and Athens contend that his conviction is politically motivated.
In July, Beleris lost an appeal that upheld his conviction and was removed from his position as mayor of Himare, without being sworn in, following a decision reached by the Central Electoral Commission.
The case against Beleris, a dual Albanian-Greek national who was elected to the European Parliament with Greece’s governing conservative party in June, has strained relations between Tirana and Athens, with Greece threatening to hold up Albania’s bid to join the European Union.
Beleris, 51, was arrested two days before the May 14, 2023, municipal elections in Himare, a town populated by ethnic Greeks on what has been dubbed the Albanian Riviera, a coastal region with burgeoning tourist development that has been rife with property disputes.
He was charged and ultimately convicted of offering about 40,000 Albanian leks (360 euros, $390) to buy eight votes, and is serving a two-year prison sentence.
Beleris has supported Gjikuria, whose 10-party Together We Win coalition includes the center-right Democratic Party of former Prime Minister Sali Berisha and the left-wing Freedom Party of former President Ilir Meta.
Beleris won last year’s mayoral race in Albania
He won last year’s election with a 19-vote lead, backed by parties opposing Rama’s governing Socialists. But he never took office, being detained until his conviction in March. An appeals court in June upheld his conviction and Albanian authorities stripped him of his title of mayor.
Beleris was given a five-day leave from prison to attend the European Parliament’s opening session in Strasbourg last month, and returned to Albania to serve out the rest of his sentence.
Although European Parliament members enjoy immunity from prosecution within the 27-state bloc, even for allegations relating to crimes committed prior to their election, Albania is not an EU member.
Beleris has claimed the case against him is politically motivated as an attempt by Rama to retain control of Himare and its potentially lucrative property potential. Albanian officials strongly reject those claims, citing the independence of the judiciary.
On Sunday, just hours before the polls opened, there were allegations of vote-buying and blackmail involving Socialist Party officials in Himare.
The Himare branch of the Omonia organization, which represents the ethnic Greek minority, issued a statement alleging that parliamentarian and local party officials were involved in attempts to influence the election outcome.
They emphasized that the evidence will not be made public but will be submitted directly to the judiciary.
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