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Albania's Ex-PM Nano Sets up New Group

20 09 2007  Tirana _ Former Albanian Prime Minister Fatos Nano is setting up a political movement in a bid that is widely seen as aimed at helping him regain the leadership of the opposition Socialists.

Nano announced the formation of a Movement for Solidarity at a meeting on Wednesday, just two months after he had been beaten into third place in Albania’s presidential election.

Nano, who gave up the party leadership after the Socialists lost the 2005 parliamentary elections, has been involved in a feud with Edi Rama, the chairman of the Socialist Party, PS, and relations between the two have further deteriorated since Rama refused to back his predecessor’s bid.

Nano told his supporters that although Rama was an excellent mayor of Tirana, he was showing authoritarian tendencies in the way he was running the party.

“I have no regrets about inviting Rama into the PS government 10 years ago. His service as mayor of the capital is undeniable, however that does not stop me from reminding Rama that he has never met with the progressive forces of the party,” Nano said.

The former prime minister added that his movement planned to rebuild the PS and improve policy-making in general, thereby helping to ensure that Albania meets the standards required for its integration into the EU and NATO.

“I am engaged with all the Socialists in this country to reform the PS, also to understand why politics has lost touch with the problems of the ordinary citizen, by not being able to safeguard their interests and the integration of the country,” he said.

With brief interruptions, Nano led the PS from 1991, when it emerged as the successor to the communist Albanian Workers’ Party, until his resignation in 2005.