The June Revolution () was a popular uprising in Albania that temporarily overthrew the Zogist regime following the 1923 Albanian parliamentary election and the assassination of popular Albanian activist and politician Avni Rustemi. A new government was established under Fan Noli that sought to implement a series of radical and liberal reforms, much to the dismay of Albania's traditional landowning class, and Ahmet Zogu would return to power after staging a counter-coup six months later with the help of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.
Background Zog's rise to power Albanian chieftain and politician Ahmet Zogu, or simply 'Zog', who would come to establish an authoritarian regime over Albania, had become increasingly involved in the Albanian political scene since after the establishment of Independent Albania in 1912. An opportunist with a lack of concern for political scruples, Zog fought both for and against the Turks, the Austro-Hungarians, Prince William of Wied, Essad Pasha Toptani and the Serbs to advance his own political aspirations.
Zog had come to take an important position in Albanian politics during the Congress of Lushnjë, which resulted in the establishment of a temporary government that would function as an important foundational development in the new post-World War I Albanian state. Although the congress resulted in the presidency of Sulejman Delvina, Zogu and Aqif Pasha Elbasani were actually the dominant political figures, and the new capital of Tirana was also conveniently situated near Zog's powerbase in the Mati region of north-central Albania. Zog was named Minister of the Interior in Delvina's cabinet, taking control of the police and the gendarmerie as well as establishing himself as commander-in-chief of the Albanian armed forces. The armed forces were completely lacklustre, save for Zog's personal retainer of around 2,000 fellow tribesmen. Albanian politics continued to be dominated by the traditional landowning aristocracy, and this ruling class of conservatives was determined to maintain the traditional system of landownership, meaning that Albania was the only country in Europe that was still primarily feudal. This gave rise to a political conflict between the conservatives and the progressives, which consisted primarily of the marginalised Catholic and Orthodox minorities, Kosovo Albanians and careerists.
With his new role, Zog engineered the fall of Delvina's government and established a clique whose primary purposes were to oppose those in power and acquire wealth and power for its own members by any means available. The clique destroyed the next government, which was led by Ilias Vrioni, and Zog settled for a military command under Pandeli Evangjeli's new regime in 1921. Evangjeli was deposed by Aqif Pasha Elbasani, who installed Kosovo Albanian politician Hasan Prishtina as the new prime minister. Prishtina and Elbasani were deposed by Zog after only 5 days following Zog's march on Tirana and his encirclement of the city. In December alone, four different cabinets were formed in the span of 18 days. Zog appointed a puppet - Xhafer Bey Ypi - in Prishtina's place whilst consolidating his own political position, while rising political figure Fan Noli was named Minister of Foreign Affairs due to his proven skill and success as a diplomat and foreign contacts. As Minister of the Interior, Zog brought increasing internal stability at the cost of increasing authoritarianism.
Zog's divided opponents were brought together by the cumulative effect of nearly two years of his rule, which only underlined the vast problems of the nation that still required solutions. The Western-educated Albanian intelligentsia feared Zog as an undereducated and unscrupulous man prone to despotism, whilst the Kosovo Albanians did not appreciate his lack of enthusiasm in supporting Albanian irredentist movements in Kosovo. Zog did not consider Kosovo to be an important issue and prioritised a normalisation of relations with the Yugoslavs over support for the Committee for the National Defence of Kosovo, which he considered to be a significant obstacle. The Kosovo Committee, which pushed for the unification of Kosovo with Albania, viewed Zog as the second coming of his distant relative Essad Pasha Toptani, a leader who was always willing to collaborate with the Serbs in return for political support. Essad Pasha was an ally to the Yugoslavs, and Zog had quickly assumed that role. This left Zog with the traditional, landowning feudal beys of central and southern Albania and a handful of northern chieftains as his only means of support in Albania. He established closer ties with prominent beys and gave the chieftains important roles in the military, paying them on a regular basis to stop them from attacking his new government. Zog had these chieftains swear loyalty to him instead of the Albanian state, but the Kosovo Albanians and other irredentist elements could not be so easily bought. Nonetheless, legislative achievements were meagre as parliament was continuously stalled by the conflicts between the progressive party and the Zog-dominated popular party.
As Minister of the Interior, Zog attempted to disarm the highlander tribes that he deemed as threats to his position, as well as the Albanians aligned with the Kosovo Committee. Zog's program of disarmament was selective, as he did not try to disarm his allies in the Mati region, and Zog's political opponents were convinced that he had undertaken the attempt at the behest of Yugoslav agents who sought to eliminate Albanian support for the Albanians of Kosovo. This culminated in a revolt in March 1922. The tribes - led by Bajram Curri, Hasan Prishtina and Elez Isufi - marched on Tirana, and even though Zog would have most certainly been overwhelmed, the attempt was unsuccessful following the intervention of the British minister Harry Eyres, who convinced the rebels to withdraw. For his part, Fan Noli resigned from his position as Minister of Foreign Affairs, citing Zog's dictatorial tendencies and his reactionary policies. Zog established a military court and hastily dispatched 32 of the rebel leaders as Xhafer Ypi, Zog's personal puppet, was reconstituted as prime minister. Ypi, who was extremely incompetent and severely lacking in intelligence, had once again begun to lose control of the country, prompting Zog to step in and replace Ypi as prime minister in December 1922 whilst retaining the position of Minister of the Interior.
1923 elections
As prime minister, Zogu's primary goal was to remain in power and establish a more authoritarian state to end the political chaos in Albania, and with the support of the landowning beys, Zog attempted to eliminate the republican political elements within the state. Zog's personal conflicts with the Kosovo Albanian leaders made him a fierce opponent of the Kosovo Albanians and the Kachak Movement, and his rise to power resulted in the end of Albanian governmental support for Kosovo.
In January 1923, Curri and Prishtina led another unsuccessful attempt at overthrowing Zog, and in between the two unsuccessful attempts of 1922 and 1923, Zog entered into a secret agreement with the Yugoslavs in which he promised to destroy the Kachak bands, among other things. In that same month, Zog's forces, in coordination with the Yugoslavs, invaded the Neutral Zone of Junik; the Kachaks left the zone and moved further into Kosovo, and the area was ceded to the Yugoslavs. The lack of support for the Kachaks was due to both the reactionary and anti-democratic policies of Zog and his supporters, and also due to the fact that the Neutral Zone of Junik, which functioned as a powerbase for the Kachaks, represented a possible threat to Albania's security regarding a possible invasion from Yugoslavia. The Yugoslavs enabled Zog's rise to power by destabilising Albania's internal political situation, allowing them to win over individual northern Albanian tribal leaders and to advance their own objectives, particularly those regarding Kosovo. Ultimately, international pressure and the lack of governmental support from Albania are the primary reasons for the failure of the Kachak Movement in Kosovo.
Elections for a constituent assembly were finally called in the summer of 1923, with the first round of voting to be held in September and the second in December. This election was to also decide the structure of the state, as the constituent assembly was to function as both a parliament and as a body in charge of drafting a new constitution to replace the statutes outlined in the Congress of Lushnjë. Once this agenda had been filled, the assembly was expected to resign before new elections were held for a regular parliament. Fan Noli, who had entered a self-imposed exile, re-entered Albanian politics to run against Zog, founding the Liberal Party in Korçë in September 1923 and establishing himself as the leading figure among the southern anti-Zogist progressives. The political scene, which had been dominated by the Popular and Progressive parties since the 1921 elections, began to diversify with the rise of new movements; reformist groups from the south and Catholic factions from the region of Shkodër established new political formations aimed at reducing the influence of the old party structures. Zog chose not to align himself with these groups and instead continued to champion himself as the only guarantor of national stability.
Zog's progressive opponents, which consisted of Avni Rustemi's Bashkimi movement, Vatra supporters from the Albanian diaspora and former Popular party members, were unified as a result of their hostility to Zog's increasing dominance, ultimately campaigning together as the Opposition Party. This was a coalition of Noli's Liberals, the Gjirokastër-based Democrats, the Vlorë-based National Democrats and Ora e Malëve from Shkodër. Bashkimi did not put forward candidates as they technically were not a political party, but their leader, Avni Rustemi, ran as a candidate for the prefecture of Kosovo (Kukës). Regionalism was possibly the greatest cause for the lack of unity between these groups, as the Opposition Party was a collection of different parties that lacked support beyond their religious or regional bases. Deep-seated differences among the progressives proved to be the major obstacle in removing Zog from power, as these groups had only appeared with the call for the 1923 elections and maintained only superficial influence.
Noli and the progressives viewed the system of indirect voting as a significant disadvantage and attempted to impose a new electoral law that would override the electoral regulations. Viewing this as the only way to counter Zog's path to dictatorship, the progressives argued that direct voting was more democratic and would lead to a more representative assembly, eliminating the opportunities for corruption and fraud that would be inherent in a second round of voting. The progressives also sought to expand the role of women in the government and to curb the political influence of the military and gendarmerie, as well as amnesties for those in charge of the rebellion in March 1922. However, Zogu and his supporters rejected these democratic efforts and refused to make concessions, resulting in the electoral law's failure to pass in a parliamentary vote.