Why is the DP opposing Ursula von der Leyen?!

By Ylli Pata

During a meeting of the Conference of Presidents in Parliament, the Democratic Party representatives Gazment Bardhi and Saimir Korreshi opposed the positions of the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. An opposition may have criticisms and dissatisfaction with the protocol stance of the head of the European Commission during her visit to Tirana, since it rightly expects her statements to feed or stir anti-majority sentiment.

Official visits also have a particularity in the logic of rigid language within an official visit, where courtesy carries the greatest weight of official speech. Nevertheless, an opposition seeks to read between the lines a message, a signal, a statement from which to take or convey a political stance.

Ursula von der Leyen is not an ordinary political figure, as she is respectively the third most important person in the world after the president of the USA and that of China. She manages a staggering budget of up to 2 trillion euros. Winning Mrs. von der Leyen’s second term, which was a complicated political mechanism in Europe’s multi-party Parliament, has given her political power that by all accounts has made her the most powerful person in Europe.

Mrs. von der Leyen is, among other things, the most influential person of the European People’s Party — respectively its leader — as well as one of the dominant names of Germany’s CDU. In short, a pure political ally of the Democratic Party. The CDU and the EPP have often supported and encouraged the opposition’s critical initiatives against the government, making them public and thus bringing an influential and powerful reaction mechanism.

But neither the EPP nor the CDU can resolve the DP’s political frustration, which has problems in the logic of public credibility. Nevertheless, contesting the positions of the head of the EU Commission is no small thing. It is a political stance, hidden in statements in the form of quips. But the essence lies in the fact that the opposition — respectively the Democratic Party, but also other parties — has not supported the positions of the head of the EU Commission on Albania’s integration.

This stance, in essence, harms neither the opposition nor its supporters, since if they speak of an authoritarian state, it is Europe that can monitor this concern of theirs. Nor is it an electoral concern, since in this respect there seems to be no concrete plan of this opposition to advance in the upcoming elections, where preparations are almost modest. Its hope, or political concept, is the removal of Edi Rama, with the idea of a technical or transitional government that could take the country into the EU — a hope born only of external factors or of SPAK’s investigations, which was also fed by the flamingo revolution, whose impact was great but whose political pamphlet was missing.

In this stance, the opposition has handed the majority a weapon regarding the political aim of entering the EU — an aim the head of the European Commission declared achievable within the promised timeframe. Does this objective harm the opposition? No, on the contrary. But it must prepare for this scenario, or come out openly if it is for the opposite scenario.