Isa Mustafa has resigned as the leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo, LDK, following a meeting of the party’s leadership on Monday. 

His resignation follows a poor showing for LDK in Sunday’s parliamentary elections, with Kosovo’s oldest political party currently sitting on 13.2 percent of the vote with 98 percent of polling stations processed. 

It is a sharp decline from the party’s performance less than 18 months ago in October 2019’s parliamentary election, when LDK came a close second to Vetevendosje with 24.5 percent of the vote. In 2019, the party received over 206,000 votes, while just 102,000 LDK votes have been counted thus far in this year’s election.

At a press conference held after Monday’s meeting, Mustafa expressed his disappointment at the result. “I called a meeting of the LDK leadership after the election results,” he said. “The result is very bad, and a result that we did not expect.”

Mustafa took full responsibility for the poor performance, stating that the party needed to be reorganised. “I want to save LDK,” he said. “To strengthen the party and return it as a political force, I will resign, and LDK will elect its next leader.”

Mustafa was elected party leader in November 2010 taking over from former president of Kosovo Fatmir Sejdiu. He served as prime minister between 2015 and 2017 as part of a coalition government between LDK and the Democratic Party of Kosovo, PDK and as mayor of Prishtina between 2007 and 2013.