The Ilinden uprising was also against the Greek terror

Concerns for the future of Macedonia, for the future of this freedom paid with many human lives and for a state of only a small part of geographic and ethnic Macedonia, are hanging over the biggest Macedonian national holiday Ilinden, and over all of us. With the last moves of the Zaev-Dimitrov duo and the signing of the embarrassing so-called Prespa agreement on renaming the Macedonians and changing the name of the Republic of Macedonia with constitutional changes, all of us are overwhelmed with fear – is this the last Ilinden that we welcome as the Republic of Macedonia? Will this be a new country next year?

Because according to the so-called Prespa Agreement the name is not the only thing changing, but also a series of other interventions that are catastrophic for the Macedonian citizen. Thus, according to the agreement, the term Macedonian, as well as Macedonian language, can refer only to the territory of the Republic of Macedonia, which means that there are no Macedonians outside the Republic of Macedonia, and no one outside the country’s borders speaks Macedonian. Thus we become the only state that does not have minorities or its minority language spoken in neighboring or other countries.

We are all aware that this does not correspond to reality, but it corresponds to the big state propaganda that is trying to prove that there are no Macedonians for two centuries, so accordingly there can not be a Macedonian state, and that it is an artificial creation. This allegation, besides being offensive, has a serious intention to jeopardize the existence of the Macedonian state. The words spoken by Metropolitan Theodosius Gologanov, one of the first church activists who were fighting for the restoration of the Ohrid Archbishopric, and today strongly remind us what is the essence of all that is happening. The Metropolitan, among other things, says: “We have not suffered so much from the Ottomans as we have from the Greeks, Serbs and Bulgarians, who, like eagles on a carcass, attacked this long-suffering country.”

To understand things today, we must go back and look at history, which has many answers to the future. All serious states do it. Here, the duo Zaev-Dimitrov says that history is not important and that we should look forward. It is an absolutely wrong thesis, because if the dangers of the past are not known, they will be transformed in a much worse form in the future. In fact, it is no coincidence that Greece insisted on such provisions in the so-called Prespa agreement. Namely, restricting the Macedonians and the Macedonian language only on the territory of present-day Republic of Macedonia, the erosion of minority care, as well as the acceptance to change all textbooks and scientific books in order to eliminate some kind of irredentism, clearly states that the Greeks seriously studied their history and know it well.

Therefore, during this Ilinden we should be aware that we have a huge danger not only from the fact that next year the state will no longer be called the Republic of Macedonia, but also that we must not tell the truth, and it is very simple and clear – the Ilinden Uprising was about forming a separate Macedonian state in its ethno-geographical borders on territory that extends to the present-day Republic of Macedonia and in the parts of Macedonia that are now parts of Greece and Bulgaria. The largest part, more than half, belongs to Greece.

Readers should know that after the formation of the Greek state, an idea called Megali appears, which has a clear goal to conquer the non-Greek territory to the north of the then-Greece, which is supposed to provide food for the rest of the country, and Pelagonia and the Thessaloniki areas are the most suitable for that. That policy has a serious organization that goes on two interlaced levels – religiously through the Greek Church and their most eminent representative, Bishop Germanos Karavengelis, who in 1900 (three years before the uprising) came to Kostur – and militarily, by recruiting an army from Greece, but and from the local population, who is paid to serve the Greek interests.

Since 1900, a serious terror has started on the Macedonian population in today’s Aegean Macedonia. Therefore, the fact that the Ilinden uprising was against the Ottoman Empire was much more against the Greek terror must be emphasized. It was not by chance that the uprising was the most massive in Aegean Macedonia and lasted from August 2 to the end of October. In it was organized local authority following the example of the Krusevo Republic, and lasted much longer than the Krusevo Republic. All the people were up on their feet, fighting groups had between 500 and 600 people each, few cities and all villages in Kostur, Lerin, Voden were kept free.

The most active in suppressing the uprising is precisely the bishop Karavangelis, who through his own people organizes to cut off the head of Lazar Pop Trajkov, one of the apostles of the uprising in this part of Macedonia. In October of 1903, when it was clear that the uprising would be stifled, Duke Vasil Cakalarov gathered the rebels of Mount Vicho, the same mountain on which forty years later the sons and grandchildren of the rebels would fight for human justice within the civil war in Greece and unfortunately they will never get it, yet they were evicted and expelled from their homes. There, on Vicho, Cakalarov says: “Now everything is finished, we have proven to whom Macedonia belongs to and whether we Macedonians deserve freedom, for which we have died, still die and will die. Go home, you are discharged, keep your heads up!”

All of this above is important because the Greek state knows it very well. Let’s be clear – I do not think we should live in the past; on the contrary, we have to look into the future, but if the Greek state is sincere that they want to build good neighborly relations, it must respect what is ours in order to respect what is theirs. This is the main reason why the so-called Prespa Agreement is harmful and we must look the truth into its eyes on this great holiday, recognize it as unsustainable and reject it as soon as possible.

Aleksandar Nikoloski