DUI leader Ali Ahmeti convened a meeting of the rival SDSM party leaders Dimitar Kovacevski and Zoran Zaev, to make sure that they are all on board ahead of the coming general and presidential elections.

According to Klan TV, the three had a long lunch today to iron out the differences between Zaev and Kovacevski. SDSM, which is being transformed into the smaller coalition partner with relation to DUI, is hit by feuding between Kovacevski and Zaev, who feels unappreciated by the new leadership after he stepped down as Prime Minister and party leader in 2022.

Kovacevski himself is supposed to step down as Prime Minister later this month, and make way for DUI’s Talat Xhaferi to become interim Prime Minister. Kovacevski plans to lead SDSM in the general elections, likely in coalition with DUI that should help disguise his party’s weakness against VMRO-DPMNE. But there were media reports that Zaev sees the moment of Kovacevski’s resignation as the perfect time to challenge him for the party leadership. This would cause a major rift in SDSM and guarantee a heavy defeat against VMRO, even with DUI’s help.

Zaev faces unprecedented pressure from the United States, after he was “casually” mentioned in a recent Treasury Department black list, as a corrupt Balkan politician. Soon afterwards, his former Deputy Prime Minister Koco Angjusev was put on the black list, and Zaev’s public attempt to defend him was received coldly by US Ambassador Aggeler. So for him, returning to the helm of SDSM or maybe even winning the presidency directly or through a crony could be the best way to stay out of legal trouble.

DUI, on the other hand, has an exceptionally bad relationship with VMRO, which is uncovering new corruption scandals by DUI officials every other day. This puts Ahmeti in possibly the worst situation he has been since first grabbing power through a civil war in 2002. The enormous expansion of DUI power through the institutions and the takeover of many lucrative departments and projects made DUI a huge target both for Albanian opposition parties and for corruption watchdogs, and recently he had an extremely rare public rebuke by a Western diplomat – the Dutch Ambassador Dirk Jan Kop. If he is to preserve his outsized role in the current Government, Ahmeti needs to keep SDSM united and also neutralize the Albanian opposition parties, hoping that he will manage to secure a draw in the general elections or prevent other Albanian parties from supporting a VMRO led Government that would investigate DUI’s corruption and criminal ties.

DUI is hoping that the upcoming visit by US Assistant Secretary of State James O’Brien next week will provide support for their positions.  During his recent visit for the OSCE summit in Skopje, O’Brien openly accosted VMRO-DPMNE.