Baraliu: Failing elections in the north is the right step

He stresses that while the legal threshold for the percentage of citizens participating in the elections, they will be legal and legitimate. Baraliu, meanwhile, says he does not expect destatement of the situation in the north, despite failing to participate in the Serbian List election on April 23rd, while stressing the need not to prevent the exercise of mandates for those winning them after the elections.

Baraliu says it is the moment of the end for citizens in the Northern Mitrovica municipality, Zubin Potok, Leposaviqi and Zvecan to have their legal institutions stemmed from an election process.

The last time citizens in those municipalities already have their own legal institutions and elections. It is the right step for the CEC not to push the elections further but to keep them. As for polling stations even earlier, there have been different practices in the world, but so have we in Kosovo who allow alternative or mobile centres to be found in addition to traditional polling stations. Depending on the circumstances of the moment, they can be such and there is nothing wrong with it, since it is imperative that these elections be held”, Baraliu declares.

He stresses that in the April 23rd elections in the north it is important to have a minimum of democratic standards. According to him, the important thing is that there are no major obstacles to citizens getting to the polls and there are no voter abuses.

Because we don't have a certain legal threshold that limits citizens' participation to election in percentages, for example. If it were 30 percent minimum or 50 percent above, then there would be barriers to legality and legitimacy... It's important that there's a minimum of democratic standards that the world uses in a country that we are, where we talk about fragile democracies. The important thing is that there's order and order, there's no voter abuse and there's no major obstacles for citizens not to come up in the election, he says.

In addition, Baraliu is more optimistic that the election process will go without any major tension. According to him, official Belgrade will not allow that after the Brussels agreement and the annex for its implementation in Ohrid.

Anything can be expected, but I don't believe, since after the Brussels and Ohrid agreement I think there are continued pressures from the international community on Vucinate. So there will be no such method as before elections were postponed because Belgrade dares not allow that. I have hope and I believe in this that those who earn the mandates and exercise them”, Baraliu declares.

However, Baraliu is critical of this unwritten agreement between Kosovo and Serbia. He considers that through it Kosovo is seriously damaged in sovereignty and functionality as an independent and democratic state.

It's wrong to accept those points. Our government is taking the step before it needs to realise that agreement, while Belgrade exhibitors are not only publicly failing to accept certain provisions of the agreement, but also at the border they are provoking by instrumentalising the situation to destabilisation... With these agreement mechanisms, Kosovo is seriously damaged. irreversibly, its sovereignty is damaged and the existence of functionality as an independent and democratic state” is questioned, it concludes.

In the April 23rd elections for the mayor of four municipalities in the north, 11 candidates will compete, with only two of them from the Serb community.

The extraordinary local elections will be held in the north following the resignation of the mayors of northern Mitrovica municipalities, Leposaviqi, Zvecan and Zubin Potok. The mayors of these municipalities resigned in November 2022 due to the government's decision on illegal Serbian plates.

The elections in the north were originally scheduled for December 18th of 2022, but they were postponed after incidents and inadequacy for their organisation.