Kosovo: Final Election Results Announced

Prishtina, Nov 4, 2004 – Recounting of votes, announced last week by the Central Election Commission (CEC) following the political entities’ complaints, was completed at midday yesterday. The OSCE mission and the Kosovo Electoral Commision announced at the same time the final results of voting, which brought only some minor changes as the preliminary ones.

According to the final results Rugova’s Democratic League of Kosova (LDK) has won the elections with 47 seats, but failed to gain the absolute majority needed to govern alone. LDK is followed by Thaçi’s Democratic Party of Kosova (PDK) with 30 seats and Ramush Haradinaj’s Alliance for Future of Kosova (AAK) with 9 seats. The new political movement “Ora” run by the wealthy Kosovo publisher Veton Surroi finished fourth with 7 gained seats.

The OSCE mission decided last Friday to recount all 660,000 votes cast on Oct. 23 following allegations of inaccuracies. Overall voter turnout was 53.4 percent, but Serbian voter turnout was only 0.35 percent.

The result leaves the balance of power relatively unchanged from the current parliament. Analysts predict a repeat of the uneasy coalition of LDK, PDK and a smaller party which together have made up the government since the last general election.

ECIKS