Ivanov in a campaign against Macedonia

Erol Rizaov

President Gjorge Ivanov, during his visit to America, called on citizens to boycott the European future of Macedonia. He did not have to travel so far away just to announce what everyone in our country already knows, that he will not fulfill his civic and presidential duties and that he will not vote.
Once it became clear that the President’s thin alibi is not valid, he fled the “crime scene”. He hid in America and decided to launch his boycott campaign from there. He turned to the citizens with rage, with anger and an unprecedented vanity explaining his motives why he decided to passively watch and mock the referendum from afar, from America. In a perfidious way, he lied that he defended the name of the state, the Macedonian nationality, the Macedonian language and the international relations with this boycott. The President calls for defense of what has never been threatened in the first place, such as the name Macedonia, the national identity of the Macedonian people, and the Macedonian language. As for the interethnic relations, he has already done more damages to all ethnic communities living in Macedonia, deciding to be president only to only a small part of the supporters of a certain political party, still loyal to the corrupt leadership that has sat on the defendant’s bench of the greatest trials since the independence of the country against the abuses of senior politicians.

President Ivanov, through a statement to the public, a week before the historic vote of the citizens, is actually attempting to destabilize the country with new divisions and hatred, because, with his messages, he threatens the Euro-Atlantic integration of Macedonia. All of Ivanov’s lies that he is in favour of Macedonia’s membership in NATO and the EU have been revealed. He never made the slightest attempt to explain how Macedonia could achieve strategic interests without accepting the agreement with Greece. He never offered, nor did he manage to give the slightest contribution to good-neighbourliness with our neighbours. The president decided to make the cowardly commitment to a boycott launched by the forces that are against the strategic interest of Macedonia, to become an ally of NATO and an EU member state. The only lucky circumstance in this propaganda activity of President Ivanov against the future of Macedonia is that he has long lost his reputation and confidence in the public. Everything else is a huge embarrassment.

President Ivanov in his cabinet statement had a strong need to explain that his constitutional and legal right is to vote or not to vote. That is true, but he will have to face the responsibility for his violation of the law by agitating for a boycott and obstructing the highest state interests. If there is rule of law in this country, the president of the state will face more lawsuits for criminal acts and flagrant violation of the constitution and laws. It would be a good prevention to protect parliamentary democracy and a serious admonition for those who abuse their powers from this high position.

Thus, the president of the state will have to explain one day before a public prosecutor on the basis of which law he interfered with the majority in parliament, and after credible elections to constitute the legislature, to obstruct the electing of a president of the parliament, the government and the prime minister. And what is worse, the impact of such decisions on the bloodshed in parliament on April 27, last year. President Ivanov will have to face responsibility for obstructing justice with abolition and filing abolition of suspected political officials for criminal association in electoral sites, including during his election as president. Also, he will have to answer for obstruction of justice for representatives of the top VMRO-DPMNE who are charged with crime, corruption, detention with political opponents with their detention and trial with orders and pressures on judges, violating human rights and freedoms of thousands of citizens and dozens more prosecution acts for serious crimes.

There is another conviction that will have historic dimensions because Ivanov will remain registered in the history and collective memory of today’s generations that he propagandized a boycott of a referendum, the highest act of expressing personal opinion of the citizens, calling for an outcome that directly threatens the future and survival of Macedonia.  After this public appearance of the president, worse than the pre-election campaign, the first thing that he should do after the successful referendum is to resign and apologize to the public for his agitation contrary to the state interests and the commitments of the majority of citizens. That resignation will also pave the way for facing justice for the crimes he has committed over his ten-year presidency.