The writing of this paper is driven from the unfinished initiative of the last legislature of the Assembly of Kosovo regarding the election of President, the last debates for the way of electing the President, and also direct declarations that the direct election of President changes the governing parliamentary system in Kosovo. Through this paper KDI aims to open a wide social and political discussion, based on regional perspectives and experiences on other ways and parameters of the election of President in the country. KDI calls for an open process where citizens can reflect their preferences.
By comparing the practices in the Parliamentary System through Europe, we see that sixteen (16) of them elect the President directly by the people, and ten (10) other countries elect the President through Parliament. From the countries in region, except Kosovo, Greece and Albania also elect President through Parliament, and all the other regional countries elect the President directly from the people. The ordinary President Election system is the “two rounds” system, or better known as “runoff” system, where a second round of elections is organized with two of first round most voted candidates. Based in the paper results, Krasniqi stated “we come to the conclusion that the change of President Election system in Kosovo, would not cause changes in the governing system in the country. What KDI wants to draw attention to, is regarding the President competences that in case of increase, there would appear the conflict of President and Prime – minister official function. Also, the Constitution of Kosovo establishes thirty (30) competences for the President, which comparing to other parliamentary systems are a lot and important ones.
We consider that the change of the President Election system should be achieved only if it is concluded that the current system, and existing competences appear to be a problem in the President’s official functioning of post, and there must not at any circumstances, be changed the way of election or increase the number of competences following personal ambitions, Krasniqi added. The President Election in Kosovo has proved to be the weakest point of governing coalitions, causing non – stability in the Government and premature elections in the country. Despite the fact that the election of President directly from the people would increase the Government stability and advance the citizens’ rights, through direct democracy, in practice it has been proven that in countries where there is no consolidated democracy – Kosovo in this case, can be abused for autocratic purposes.
In this paper, it has been analyzed also the technical aspect and the best international standards of organizing presidential elections. Krasniqi stated based in the analysis done to the Draft – Law of Election of the President of Republic of Kosovo, which results from the ad – hoc commission on Constitutional Changes of Assembly of Kosovo of 2012 work, we conclude that for the next President mandate which is provided to start in April of 2016, there is not enough time for constitutional and legal changes to be approved in regularly time limits. The Draft – Law provides that the Assembly President announce presidential elections six months before the end of actual Presidential mandate, which according to calendar means the elections to be announced on October the 7th of this year, a very short time that could bring to an equitable time for other candidates to be prepared for the election campaign. Also, the Venice Commission recommends that changes of election system should be made not within the years where is provided elections to be held.
During the conference, there were presented results of survey with citizens on the President Election system. Krasniqi stated that there has been contracted a professional company to question the citizens and that a field research was conducted between the dates 26 June and 6 July 2015. The error margin is +-3.1%. Within the research there have been questioned 1,000 Kosovo citizens, over 18 years old.
Results are as follows:
1. In the question regarding to citizens preferences on the President Election system, 89.7% of them declared to be pro the election directly from the people, and only 10.3% declared pro actual system.
2. Regarding the election participation in case of directly elections from the people, 84.8% of citizens declared to go to the polls, which is a bigger participation than the last officially parliamentary elections with only 42.63%. Only 4.3% of questioned citizens declared non – participation in the elections. The voters not sure about their participation in presidential elections are 10.9%.
3. The third question directed to citizens was regarding their preferences for the person they would like to see as future President of the country. The question was open and questioned people were free to express their preferences. According to survey results there is not a consensual candidate that would receive the majority of citizens’ votes, which means that in case of direct elections, there would have to be held a second round of elections, between the two most voted candidates.
4. However, the favorite person from the citizen as a future President in the PDK leader Hashim Thaçi with 29.6%. The second favorite candidate according to citizens was the ex – Vetëvendosje leader Albin Kurti with 17.1% of votes. The AAK leader Ramush Haradinaj was the third favorite with 10.6%. A considerable part of 9.8% declared not to have a favorite candidate, while 6.9% declared that would want someone out of actual political scene. The actual President Atifete Jahjaga seems not to have citizens’ support for a second mandate, being preferred by only 2% of the questioned citizens.