Kosovo’s Constitutional Court on Friday gave MPs another 30 days to elect a speaker and constitute a parliament, but changed the terms for candidacies for the speaker’s post after months of political deadlock.

The court said that no candidate for speaker can be nominated more than three times, and ordered MPs to be present in the chamber and vote for the speaker and their deputies.

It also said the acting speaker, parliament’s oldest MP, Avni Dehari, from the biggest party, Vetevendosje, had violated the constitution by continuing to call on lawmakers to vote to establish a commission that would instigate a secret ballot for the speaker’s role.

Dehari had “not acted in accordance with the judgment of the Constitutional Court … of 26 June 2025,” the court said, referring to the day when it ordered MPs to inaugurate parliament within 30 days.

In total, MPs have failed to inaugurate parliament 54 times in a row since April 15..

The court told Dehari to “invite representative of the biggest parliamentary group to propose a candidate for speaker who should be elected via an open vote, which can happen only up to three times for the same candidate”.

Since the last elections in February, the winning party, Vetevendosje, has continued to insist on proposing the same candidate, the acting Justice Minister, who has been unable to attract enough votes. Parliament has remained in deadlock since it first met in April.

Vetevendosje MP and acting Finance Minister Hekuran Murati attacked the court ruling on Facebook as arbitrary and unfair.

“The decisions of this court are not based on the Constitution,” he said. “This is not justice. This is clientelistic arbitrariness whose aim is to secure for the old guard on the table what the people did not give them with a vote”.

The opposition Democratic League of Kosovo, LDK, on the other hand, welcomed the ruling.

Its leader, Lumir Abdixhiku, whose party referred the planned secret vote on a speaker to a constitutional review, wrote on Facebook that the court “fully upheld our requests and the case drafted by the LDK”. He called the court decision a “big win for democracy; a big win for Kosovo”.

On May 1, Vetevendosje proposed to establish a committee in charge of a secret vote for a speaker and Dehari had asked the political parties to propose candidates. They all refused to join the committee, considering its agenda illegal.

A government in Kosovo cannot be formed without the election of a speaker and deputies, and the current government can only function with limited capacities. This led to the intervention of the Constitutional Court.