The working class of Albania is now being shut out of any say in how their country is governed.
Ramiz Alia’s opportunist faction, who have a firm grip on the ruling Party of Labour of Albania (PLA), are muzzling the working class to stifle opposition to their capitalist counter-revolution. Alia & Co prevented rank-and-file industrial workers from being included on the 243-strong list of PLA candidates for the March 31 People’s Assembly election.
Zeri i Popullit, the PLA Central Committee’s daily paper, published details of the class composition of 241 out of the 243 PLA candidates. A People’s Voice translation of the Zeri i Popullit article reveals that these PLA candidates are economists, engineers, teachers, party officials, agronomists, lawyers, army officers, state officials, scientists, artists, doctors, etc – but not a single industrial worker.
Here is a breakdown of the class background of these 241 PLA candidates:
Engineers 58 (23%)
Agronomists – 56 (22%)
Economists 37 (15%)
PLA officials – 18 (7%)
Teachers 14 (6%)
Doctors 14 (6%)
Army officers – 6 (2.4%)
Chemists – 6 (2.4%)
Veterinarians – 5 (2%)
Managers 4 (1.6%)
Lawyers 4 (1.6%)
Mathematicians – 3 (1.2%)
Writers 3 (1.2%)
Zoologists 3 (1.2%)
Physicists – 2 (1%)
Scientists – 2 (1%)
Editors – 2 (1%)
Artists – 2 (1%)
Pensioner – 1
War veteran – 1
The March 31 election results gave the PLA two-thirds of the seats in the People’s Assembly. The PLA’s most solid backing came from electorates in the countryside.
Most of the remaining one-third of seats went to the stridently pro-capitalist Democratic Party DP). The People’s Voice doesn’t have details of the class composition of DP election candidates. However, since the DP leadership is composed almost exclusively of anti-communist intellectuals, it is a safe bet that very few (if any) of its candidates were industrial workers.
The PLA suffered most of its losses in city electorates. Even the president of Albania, Ramiz Alia, was chucked out of his Tirana seat. This must be counted as a mass protest vote against the PLA by the working class concentrated in the city electorates.
Regardless of which party won the March 31 election, the Albanian working class had to lose. The leadership of both the PLA and the Democratic Party are dedicated to transforming Albania as fast as possible into a rich man’s paradise where workers are the exploited wage slaves of capital.
The working class gains of the past will be totally wiped out by the pro-capitalist policies of the PLA and DP. And the working class is being denied even token representation in the Albanian Government by the total lack of proletarian candidates put forward by the PLA.
Working class interests in Albania cannot find expression through either the PLA or the DP. The workers need to form a genuine communist party to stem the tide of capitalist counter-revolution.