He is the country’s former controversial president who is running to lead his country again.

But the man he is running against wants to put him in prison before he can get a chance to do so.

No, we are not talking about President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump.

Instead, we are talking about Albania, where, in imitation of the U.S., Prime Minister Edi Rama and the reigning Socialist political establishment want to keep Sali Berisha, the Donald Trump of the Balkans, from returning to power, and will do anything to stop him.

Rather than face Berisha, a former president and prime minister, in an upcoming election, Rama, with the help of the Biden administration, is seeking to wreck him — including keeping him off the ballot — the way Biden is doing to Trump.

Last week, to the jeers of Berisha’s minority Democrat Party in the Parliament, Rama’s majority Socialist voted to strip Berisha of his parliamentary and legal immunity after he was charged with corruption.

The move paves the way to place him under house arrest or send him to prison pending further investigation.

It also keeps him from campaigning against Rama in the upcoming 2025 elections, the way Biden is trying to do to Trump in 2024.

At the same time, the Albanian parliament has refused to create a commission to investigate Rama and his connections with disgraced former top FBI counterintelligence official Charles McGonigle.

McGonigle, one of the highest-ranking FBI officials to be charged with a crime, was sentenced to four years in prison early this month after pleading guilty to conspiring to launder money related to a Russian oligarch sanctions scheme.

McGonigle is also accused of hiding $225,000 in payments from an Albanian former intelligence agent living in New Jersey.

McGonigle, who went rogue, made several unreported trips to Albania, where political corruption and money laundering are rampant, in 2017 and 2018 accompanied by the Albanian agent.

He secretly met with Rama in Tirana in 2017 where oil field drilling licenses were allegedly discussed. McGonigle even gifted Rama an FBI baseball cap, which Rama undoubtedly has ditched by now.

While the McGonigle/Rama connection made big news in Tirana following McGonigle’s arrest and now his sentencing, Rama has been able to weather the storm, adopting a “McGonigle who?” position.

He has, however, acknowledged meeting with McGonigle but has denied any wrongdoing. He has also successfully warded off any investigation into their relationship.

He has strong support from the U.S. Embassy in Tirana, whose former ambassador campaigned for Rama in the last election. He also has the support of U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken whose State Department earlier declared Berisha a “persona non grata” over unannounced corruption charges made eight years after Berisha left office.

Berisha claims Blinken went after him because of his longstanding criticism of George Soros, who is doing to the Albanian justice system what he has done to the justice system in the U.S. The Blinken family has close ties to the billionaire Sorors.

Unlike the U.S., Albania has no plans to hold Rama accountable for his secret dealings with McGonigle.

But the Rama jihad against his archrival Berisha could backfire just the way Biden’s use of the Justice Department to go after Trump has backfired on him.

The more Trump is hounded by Biden’s Justice Department and the Democrat-controlled courts, the more popular he gets.

The more Rama goes after Berisha, the stronger Berisha gets.

What is sad about it all is this: Little struggling former communist countries like Albania imitate the United States and look upon it as a beacon of democracy where the rule of law prevails.

What they now see is democracy and the rule of law ripped apart by one president trying to hold on power by imprisoning his opponent.

It is a green light to do the same.

So they do it.

Peter Lucas is a veteran Massachusetts political reporter and columnist. He is the author of “The OSS in World War II Albania.”