MACEDONIA AFTER PARTY CONGRESSES

AIM, Skopje, May 11, 1995

Macedonia did not experience any political disturbances after the Congresses. Primarily in the opposition. Namely, towards the end of last month and last weekend, two congresses of opposed and respectable political parties were held. One was held by the most influential ruling party whose member is the current Macedonian President, Kiro Gligorov - the Social Democratic Alliance of Macedonia (it has 60 out of the total of 120 deputy seats). The other, by the most powerful opposition party which was, by its own will of course, having boycotted the second round of autumn parliamentary elections, left without any seats in the Assembly - the Congress of the VMRO-DPMNE.

Although the congresses have in a certain way, predicted a continuity of the political parties which held them, since there were no serious changes in their leaderships, a certain shift in the VMRO-DPMNE was felt. Having spoken critically about its own bad assessments in the past, this party announces that in the future it will pay more attention to "political pragmatism", not eliminating the possibility to become the core around which the opposition block which almost entirely remained outside the parliament after the last elections may be gathered some day.

The former young presidents remained in the leaders' seats of the two angriest political opponents - the Social Democratic Alliance and the VMRO-DPMNE - who are both just over thirty years old, so that their destiny will be to challenge each other on the Macedonian political scene for many years to come. The head of the Social Democrats is still the Macedonian Prime Minister, Branko Crvenkovski, and the head of the VMRO-DPMNE is Ljupco Georgievski, who, among other, has a collection of erotic poetry in his pre-political bibliography. Judging by the time which is coming, one could say that in relation to the time when he entered the world of politics, the politically more mature Ljupco Georgievski has a considerable advantage. Primarily because of the current economic and social situation in Macedonia. This once poorest republic of former Yugoslavia, under pressure exerted by the international financial institutions, has entered into a very difficult period of privatization accompanied by increasing unemployment. More and more inhabitants are living a more and more difficult life. The number of unemployed persons might soon reach the figure of 300 thousand in this country with two-million inhabitants.

In other words, the tactics Georgievski described as "waiting for the errors of the opponent" which are inevitable, when his opponent is operating in such conditions, even if objectively they make no errors whatsoever, can easily be successful. An ordinary man can blame hardly anyone but the authorities for the fact that he is having a hard life. Altogether, although outside the parliament, Georgievski is becoming more dangerous for the administration. It is questionable, though, whether this will be sufficient for him to achieve his basic goal. And it is, as he said, to force the administration to call early elections and to see the opposition come to power. The fact that Macedonia has managed to sign a "stand-by" arrangement with the IMF can thwart his designs, because, as Skopje calculates, this could bring Macedonia between 450 and 500 million dollars of fresh money in the form of favourable credits in the course of this and next year. In order to accomplish this, it will be necessary to reduce the last year's inflation of 54 per cent down to 18.5 per cent, to increase foreign currency reserves up to 200 million dollars (at the moment they amount to about 150 million follars), and maintain the privatization rate at a satisfactory level. That is, to privatize 940 out of the 1500 enterprises which are awaiting this destiny. Briefly, the better the economic situation, and the lower the social pressure, the harder it will be for Ljupco Georgievski to make a breakthough towards winning the power, although he will certainly not give up testing the disposition of the public by organizing various protests. Undoubtedly, though, his policy is becoming more meaningful, and judging by his latest public statements, it is also becoming more pragmatic. It is also evident that slowly, but surely, he is abandoning the radical rhetoric remembered from the first parliamentary elections, which brought his party the epithet of being the most radical anti-Albanian party, and classified him among the people who cannot be imagined to sit down at a table with the Albanians. And forming more than 21 per cent of the population, they are certainly a respectable political factor.

Nowadays, when it is quite certain that he has armed himself with the attribute of being the unquestioned leader of his supporters, who are ready to connive at his actions, Ljupco Georgievski even has the courage to declare publicly that he is ready to talk with Arben Dxaferi or Menduh Taci, Albanian politicians who are considered as radicals by the Macedonian public. In any case, judging probably that Macedonian voters are afraid of political radicalism even when it has a markedly pro-Macedonian prefix, Georgievski is getting rid of the anti-Albanian complex. Whether this is just a rhetorical gaffe and a shift, is less important at this moment.

He preserved his radicalism only in reference to the authorities, so everything is crackling with abusive epithets when he accuses them of being incompetent to respond to the challenges of the time and resolve the vital problems of the Macedonian state and when he accuses them of having legalized an unheard of robbery committed by their proteges under the pretext of privatization. He especially likes to stress that they are "neo-Communists" who are just skillfully disguising themselves by rejecting their Communist past.

VERA GEORGIEVSKA