Race for New Macedonian Opposition Leader Begins

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  • Tomche Makedonche
    Senior Member
    • Oct 2011
    • 1123

    Race for New Macedonian Opposition Leader Begins

    Several high-ranking Macedonian party officials are possible contenders for the empty seat of opposition leader, amid ongoing suspicions that the election will be plagued by fraud.


    Race for New Macedonian Opposition Leader Begins

    Several high-ranking Macedonian party officials are possible contenders for the empty seat of opposition leader, amid ongoing suspicions that the election will be plagued by fraud

    After formally accepting the resignation of long-standing opposition leader Nikola Gruevski on Sunday night, Macedonia’s main opposition right-wing VMRO-DPMNE party is set to elect his successor from several possible contestants. The extraordinary congress is scheduled for December 22-23.

    According to unnamed sources close to the party’s leadership, several high ranking party officials are favorites in the race for the empty seat. However, only one candidate – former MP Filip Petrovski – has officially submitted his candidacy so far.

    Party insiders see VMRO-DPMNE secretary general Hristijan Mickovski as one of the likely favourites and former leader Gruevski's pick for the position. However, they also say he has a questionable level of support from the party base.

    Three current MPs have been put forward as potential candidates. Former Foreign Minister Antonio Milososki, as well as MPs Ilija Dimovski and Vlatko Gjorcev have the best standing in the party base.

    Some see another former foreign minister, Nikola Poposki as a strong contender, hoping he could use his diplomatic skills to improve party’s shattered image among Western democracies following a two-year political crisis which saw the ousting of VMRO-DPMNE from power.

    Gruevski announced his resignation earlier this month, after his party suffered a crushing defeat during October's local elections.

    His resignation also comes after the party was ousted from government this May, ending 11 consecutive years in power. Over this period, Gruevski and the party leadership were widely accused corruption and authoritarian tendencies, for which many former high ranking officials, including Gruevski, are currently facing trials.

    But members of VMRO-DPMNE who were seeking thorough party reforms and democratisation in order to escape the clutches of former leader Gruevski, remain suspicious about the congress.

    VMRO-DPMNE party veteran and member of the reformist fraction, Nenad Novkovski, sees the speedy setting up of the party congress as yet another scam in which Gruevski could be free to handpick his successor, which he says would be illegitimate.

    “Without the election of brand new central committee members and the election of new delegates which would then pick a new party leader and a new executive committee, the possible election of a new leader, by someone’s liking, would be completely illegitimate,” Novkovski said.

    The new party leader will be established after more than 500 party delegates vote at the congress.

    However, these are the same delegates unanimously elected Gruevski at the last party congress in 2015, despite widespread allegations that he had masterminded the mass illegal wiretapping of over 20,000 people.

    Gruevski denies these allegations to this day, insisting that all the scandals laid against him and his closest associates over the past two years were part of an elaborate international scheme aimed at toppling him from power in order to weaken Macedonia's international position.
    “There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part, you can’t even passively take part, and you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus and you’ve got to make it stop, and you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you’re free, the machine will be prevented from working at all” - Mario Savio
  • Vangelovski
    Senior Member
    • Sep 2008
    • 8531

    #2
    Originally posted by Tomche Makedonche View Post
    Gruevski denies these allegations to this day, insisting that all the scandals laid against him and his closest associates over the past two years were part of an elaborate international scheme aimed at toppling him from power in order to weaken Macedonia's international position.
    The Security Council stayed up late working on that one, but they got him. I'm picturing Hitler's bunker (who's still alive and part of the plot), with Putin, Merkel and Obama/Trump drinking coffee and smoking cigars, 4am, plotting Gruevski's downfall.
    If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and restore their land. 2 Chronicles 7:14

    The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people; a change in their religious sentiments, of their duties and obligations...This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people was the real American Revolution. John Adams

    Comment

    • Skolovranec
      Junior Member
      • Mar 2017
      • 52

      #3
      Mickovski is the most likely one, but a double-edged sword nonetheless.
      Anti-EU Pro-Guns National-Libertarian Trekkie Minarchist
      Anti-NATO Pro-United MK Agnostic Secularist Magick Occultist
      Anti-UN Pro-Military Meritocratic Integrationist Altruistic Socio-Darwinist
      Anti-Globalist Pro-Choice Intellectual Pirate Spiritual Vagabond

      Comment

      • Gocka
        Senior Member
        • Dec 2012
        • 2306

        #4
        When you take into account how useless Macedonians are at basically everything its nothing short of laughable that anyone would put in that much effort. Macedonia is like that hostage you regret taking, they are more trouble than they are worth. Staying on the hostage theme, Macedonians also overvalue their own worth as hostages.

        Originally posted by Vangelovski View Post
        The Security Council stayed up late working on that one, but they got him. I'm picturing Hitler's bunker (who's still alive and part of the plot), with Putin, Merkel and Obama/Trump drinking coffee and smoking cigars, 4am, plotting Gruevski's downfall.

        Comment

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