SKOPJE - MINIMUM CHANCES FOR ALL

Political Parties in Macedonia

AIM Skopje, 1 September, 1997

The worst thing that may happen to a country is to be put in the position to choose between two evils. At this moment, Macedonia and its citizens appear to be faced with such a challenge, at least concerning what political option they will choose and which political party in the country is at least slightly less evil than the others. Although the possibilities are not very numerous, this does not make the choice much easier, because the experience with political parties unambiguously shows that not one of them, through its actions and specific moves, had done anything significant for Macedonia and in this way deserved the confidence of the voters.

The party currently in power, the left-oriented Social Democratic Alliance (SDSM), thanks to the Liberals with whom it ran in a coalition in the last elections, and especially thanks to the fact that at its head stood the charismatic and popular president of the state Kiro Gligorov, won in a landslide and at that moment it was believed that there was no force which could move it from its unquestioned position for decades. However, less than three years later, the SDSM has lost its high rating so that according to the latest data of Gallup's institute for public opinion investigations, less than ten per cent of the voters would vote for these ex-communists in the next elections (soon it will be known whether they will be regular or early). This catastrophic percentage in favour of the until recently most powerful Macedonian party is certainly the result of the manner in which this party ruled. Practically, except for some minor success on the international level (although even that is quite disputable), the Social Democrats cannot brag of having done anything very significant in any segment of the society. On the contrary, conviction of the people grows that they and their policy are the main causes of the difficult economic situation in which Macedonia is, the terrible impoverishment of the citizens, enormous unemployment, lack of investments, closing down of many economic facilities (even dying out of entire branches of the economy), unsuccessful privatization, adoption of non-constitutional laws, and so on. The current authorities are most of all reproached for organized crime and involvement of high government officials in it, who have by abusing their posts inflicted great damage on the society by squeezing out money from the citizens and piling it on their own bank accounts. The blame is also laid on the SDSM and its government headed by young and arrogant Branko Crvenkovski for the increased tensions in inter-ethnic relations and the already clearly expressed animosity between the Macedonians and the Albanians.

All these "merits" of the SDSM, there should be no doubt, assist its political opponents, primarily the nationalistic VMRO-DPMNE. According to the same probing of the public opinion made by Gallup's Institute, 20 per cent of subjects declared that they would choose this rightist party, which has never been the case before in the seven-year period of multi-partism in the Republic of Macedonia. But, regardless of the current disposition of the voters, probably more as a result of discontent with the situation in the country and lost confidence in the current authorities, the VMRO-DPMNE does not seem to be the political force in the country which could turn things in the direction towards improvement. Primarily for the simple reason that it has never had, just as it still has no real experts, capable, experienced people who would competently and readily deal with problems. No matter how persistently one tried to find in the leadership of this party someone who would be suitable for a post in the cabinet, it would turn out to be a Sisyphean task. But, this party certainly does not lack narrow-minded nationalists, national romantics, adventurers and persons with rural spirit and behavior. Any Macedonian voter in his right mind knows that if VMRO-DPMNE won power, it would necessarily mean abandoning of the civic concept of the society and even more neurotic relations with the Albanian population in the Republic of Macedonia, and even direct threat of a "close encounter" of the two predominant ethnic groups in the country. Everything the Republic of Macedonia has achieved internationally so far, as the leader of this party, Ljubco Georgievski, declares, would be nullified and declared invalid, and this in itself speaks of the nature of these politicians and their policy. Due to such declarations and its obsession with the Jacobinic principle "those who are not with me - are against me", which suggests the intention of the VMRO-DPMNE to square accounts and introduce repression against all its political opponents if it wins power, causes great fear among the citizens of Macedonia and certainly greatly decreases its chances to win the next elections.

Once two respectable parties - the Democratic Party of Pero Gosev and the Liberal Party of Stojan Andov - are nowadays merged into a single one, the Liberal Democratic Party, objectively have not much chance to participate in the new authorities. The impression is, moreover, that they would have won more seats in the parliament individually, because each one would have had its own political colour and image, of course, and its own supporters who grew fewer because they disagreed with this union and, as many say, unnatural connection, so that according to the public opinion poll, the newly-formed LDP has only three per cent of supporters, while the Liberal Party in the 1994 elections won twenty seats in the parliament out of 120 on its own. The Democrats did not participate in those elections, or more precisely, together with the VMRO-DPMNE boycotted the second election round (they believed the elections were fixed), but according to the assessments at the time it was considered that about 12 per cent of the voters would have voted for them, mostly in the cities. Come what may, the situation is now drastically changed and it is much more than just an impression that this fusion has melted the confidence the Liberals and the Democrats enjoyed separately.

The fourth and undoubtedly, last political force in the Republic of Macedonia consists of two Albanian political parties. Before the developments in Gostivar where due to taking down of the Albanian flag demonstrations of the Albanian population broke out and bloody conflict with the police, the Democratic Party of the Albanians (DPA) headed by Arben Xhaferi and the Party of Democratic Prosperity (PDP) of Abdurahman Aliti were on two completely different political positions, or rather more precisely, the former was in the opposition and the latter in the coalition with the Social Democratic Alliance and had a significant role in the authorities. However, after the brutal intervention of the special police in the town in the western part of Macedonia against everything that is Albanian, the DPA and the PDP were united by ethnic interest, so that in the future their coordinated and joint appearance in racing for power should be expected. The situation is clear and certain concerning this, so that it is even now possible to say how many deputies these two parties will have in the Macedonian parliament: twenty or twenty three deputies (depending on the election model) is to be expected. At the same time, it should also be expected that concerning certain issues connected with the sphere of inter-ethnic relations, party colours and programs will fade and the only division will be between the Macedonian and the Albanian block.

As things stand at the moment, nobody in the Republic of Macedonia can win the number of votes needed to win power and form the government, and this suggests that coalitions will be necessary. However, relations between political parties in the country are such that each one of them is faced with the unsolvable problem who could be its coalition partner, because the cards have been shuffled so thoroughly, and political parties have mutually quarrelled so badly, that it is simply impossible to find anything, any joint objective and interest which could be the necessary connective tissue.

MILAN BANOV