Macedonia: Opposition Accuses President Of Attempted Coup

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By Sinisa Jakov Marusic

Opposition leader Zoran Zaev says president’s decision to refuse him the mandate to form a new government amounts to an attempted coup.

Zoran Zaev, leader of the opposition Social Democrat party, SDSM, accused the country’s president on Wednesday evening of a coup d’état after refusing to award Zaev the mandate to form a government.

President Gjorge Ivanov denied Zaev the right to form a government earlier on Wednesday, despite the fact the SDSM leader has demonstrated he has the parliamentary majority needed to do so.

Zaev insisted the president should retract his decision to withhold the mandate immediately.

“Ivanov has performed a coup. He has pushed Macedonia into a constitutional and national crisis by denying the will of the majority of citizens and by preventing a legal and legitimate transfer of power,” Zaev said.

“I call on citizens not to succumb to provocations. Let’s stay calm and on the side of democratic processes which lead towards the formation of a new democratic government that will be focused on people’s real needs and on the rule of law.”

Zaev also said that his party is carefully analysing its next steps.

“We need to be wise about our next steps. Perhaps someone expects counter reactions, counter provocations. We won’t allow it.”

Ivanov refused to give the mandate to Zaev claiming the SDSM leader had the potential to “destroy the country” by accepting the demands of the country’s ethnic Albanian parties.

“The constitution and my conscience forbid me from extending a mandate to anyone who destroys the sovereignty and integrity of Macedonia,” Ivanov said, adding that Zaev must first publicly reject a “platform coming from a foreign country”, presumably referring to Albania.

Ivanov insisted that the ethnic Albanian platform, which was the main precondition for ethnic Albanian parties to support any government coalition after the December 11 general election, breached the constitution and the 2001 Ohrid Peace Accord which granted greater rights to the country’s ethnic Albanians.

EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn stated on Wednesday evening that the EU “have repeatedly stated that all leaders of the country, including the President, must respect the outcome of the recent elections.”

“In a democracy, one must acknowledge parliamentary majorities, even if one doesn’t like them.

“I therefore expect all political leaders and institutions to let the democratic process run its course – in the interest of the country’s citizens,” Hahn wrote in a statement.
– See more at: http://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/macedonia-opposition-accuses-president-of-attempted-coup-03-01-2017#sthash.DGbwgQfr.dpuf

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The Balkan Insight (formerly the Balkin Investigative Reporting Network, BIRN) is a close group of editors and trainers that enables journalists in the region to produce in-depth analytical and investigative journalism on complex political, economic and social themes. BIRN emerged from the Balkan programme of the Institute for War & Peace Reporting, IWPR, in 2005. The original IWPR Balkans team was mandated to localise that programme and make it sustainable, in light of changing realities in the region and the maturity of the IWPR intervention. Since then, its work in publishing, media training and public debate activities has become synonymous with quality, reliability and impartiality. A fully-independent and local network, it is now developing as an efficient and self-sustainable regional institution to enhance the capacity for journalism that pushes for public debate on European-oriented political and economic reform.

2 thoughts on “Macedonia: Opposition Accuses President Of Attempted Coup

  • March 3, 2017 at 1:27 pm
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    Mr. Hahn,do you know Macedonia’s constitution,and don’t you know the constitution is the law of a nation?Mr. Hahn,you are working for G.Soros not for the people that elected you.You can sheave your EU into your ass,and that goes for your NATO.You have demonstrated that you are more of a Pimps than anything else.Why don’t you respect the outcome of the decision of International Court of Justice Macedonia V Greece?EU and NATO don’t respect the basic Human Rights of the nation.Why did you join the American ambassador J.Baily who are the real threat to Macedonia who are undermining the nations sovereignty. Zaev has committed a treason,how can a president of a nation allow someone to destroy the nation.Zaev with the Ambassadors,Baily,Garrett and EU representatives in Macedonia have been undermining the countrys courts,instaling a the SPO that is illegal by the constitution of this nation.Mr. Hahn,how long was Brussels without a government,did you put same pressure as you continue your pimping for Greece on the nations constitutional name?How dare you !!!

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  • March 5, 2017 at 7:15 am
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    They blame everyone but themselves. Its Greece’s fault. It’s the Albanians fault. Its Soros’s fault. Its Hillary’s fault, Its the Bulgarians fault. It’s the Serbs fault. Its Zaevs fault, It’s a conspiracy theory.
    When will this nation wake up to itself. They are Slavs and as such need to celebrate their Slavic culture. They cannot use the name Macedonia. It’s not theirs to use. They were till 1991 Yugoslavia. Any name that Yugoslavia gave the region was harmless because it was encompassed within a sovereign country. The name they have now is harmful. Its offensive to the Greeks. Its offensive to the Albanians. Its offensive to history. Its offensive to Bulgaria. Its offensive to academia. Its offensive to its population. They have set themselves up for a civil war. The Albanians need very little provocation for war. The pseudo Macedonians with their nationalistic rhetoric which has been instilled into them by Gruevski over the last 11 years will use any excuse for a fight with their neighbors.
    They need an about face as a nation. They need to resolve the name issue with Greece. They need to embrace a multi ethnic stance in relation to the Turks and Albanians within their country. They need to eradicate the false ideology that permeates their state run media. They need to turn to their qualified academics who have been silenced, victimized and ostracized for formulating an internal cultural platform that befits their ethnicity. The false antiquization program of Gruevski needs to be dismantled and this means renaming, re branding and re educating. Its almost like Hitler’s Germany in there at the moment. de antiquate. re educate. embrace. If they follow this plan all will be fine. If they don’t they will definitely end up in a bloody civil war. I fear the worst.

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