Kosovo snap poll unlikely to end damaging deadlock

SKOPJE

Before the first vote is even cast in Kosovo's snap election on Dec. 28, experts predict it is unlikely to end the political crisis that has been gripping Europe's youngest country for almost a year.

The Balkan nation has been politically deadlocked since the inconclusive vote in February, which outgoing premier Albin Kurti's Vetevendosje (VV) party won but without enough seats to form a government.

After months of wrangling in a stalled parliament, the caretaker prime minister is going back to the electorate in a vote that analysts say will change very little.

"I think that the 28 elections will not bring any clarity," economist Mehmet Gjata told AFP as he predicted Kurti's party would come out on top again.

Political analyst Fatime Hajdari agreed that "chances were high" that VV would secure the most votes, but said little else was clear.

If anyone can secure a majority, Kurti, once dubbed Kosovo's Che Guevara for his radical past, has a rare record.

His party swept to power in 2021 in the largest electoral victory since the country's independence from Serbia in 2008, taking over 50 percent of the vote.

Kurti's blend of nationalism and a reform agenda has proven popular in a country whose sovereignty is still contested by Serbia, more than two decades after its war for independence ended.

But Gjata says things may have changed since Kurti's last term.

"I'm afraid that the current political crisis will repeat itself, because VV will not get more than 50 percent of the votes," the economist said.

"We will have no winner again."

The largest opposition parties have refused to join a Kurti coalition, all but assuring a fragmented parliament.