Triumph of “the Will”

Gjorgji Spasov

As in the Nazi propaganda film “The Triumph of the Will,” ordered by Hitler to mark the party congress in Nuremberg in 1934, these days, after the press conference, in the media images and events of joy of those, who by calling the boycott managed to prevent “the serious crime of power” and those 600 thousand citizens who voted “for” accepting an agreement with Greece and opening the way to Macedonia’s membership in NATO and the EU.

The media published photographs of Mirka, Milenko and Pandov giving us the middle finger. The “ideologists” of the boycott also took pictures: the former runaway from SDSM Solza Grceva, the anti-NATO Biljana Vankovska, Zidas Daskalovski who made lots of money from the EU funds and the mother-in-law of Dimitar Apasiev, Gordana Siljanovska at a joint feast after the referendum. On the same day after the referendum, the hard-liners from the Christian Brotherhood celebrated their victory on the town square in front of the Parliament, joined by Apasiev’s party Levica wthat chanted “NATO – Killers”, supporters of the World Macedonian Congress of Todor Petrov, the headquarters of “Boycott” with Sotir Kostov and Filip Petrovski and others that are regarded as deserving of the “defense of the name” that domestic traitors and their Western allies have “sold”. The London Guardian said it was Moscow’s victory in Macedonia. Moscow congratulates President Gjorge Ivanov on preventing Western influence in Macedonia. And Ivanov delivered a speech in which, in spite of the publicly expressed will of 600 thousand citizens in support of the agreement, congratulated the “quiet majority” (Macedonians), who by abstaining demonstrated the will of the people, he also demanded responsibility from those who work against the “sovereign will of the Macedonian people,” and in the spirit of Russian propaganda, accused the United States and the EU of interfering in our internal affairs and took sides immorally.

Immediately after this demonstration of the “Triumph of the will,” the leader of the newly founded pro-Russian party, United Macedonia, threatened MPs from VMRO-DPMNE – that “his party was aware of some attempt of bribery and that if they did such a thing, he will not allow them to even reach he state border in their attempt to escape from Macedonia.”

Similar to Hitler, who succeeded to set national socialism and racial purity to citizens of Germany as a struggle for “national pride” and national unity against the rest of the world, as well as the remnants of Gruevski’s regime today, reinforced by several anti-NATO critiques and some pro-Russian Christian fraternities, do everything to keep Macedonia isolated from the world in the name of the “holy war of defending the name Macedonia”.

The main opposition party in Macedonia, which heads this process, ignores the explanations of its best expert of the Balkans’ political history, Vlado Popovski, according to whom it is “illusory to expect that someone could have achieved a better deal than this one with Greece”. The party does not accept the call of its founder Ljupco Georgievski that this agreement deserves support. It does not accept the suggestions from its sister-parties in Europe that financed and supported the party for years, nor do they listen to the opinions of some of their MPs who consider that “boycotting the referendum” and not voting in the Assembly for the revision of the constitution, this party will not only isolate Macedonia from the world, but will isolate the party itself from all its friends and supporters.

Asked whether the boycott supporters and VMRO-DPMNE, following this “great success” in the referendum, believe that the people’s will for NATO and EU membership will be able to achieve it by reaching a better agreement with Greece in near or distant future, the party leadership did not answer. They only state that with this “bad” agreement signed by the current government, without reaching a previous national consensus in the country for it, Macedonia’s position in future negotiations is already worsened, and none of them can guarantee that a better deal could be reached. Because reaching an agreement with Greece on the name differences, under the auspices of the United Nations is a condition for Macedonia’s membership in NATO and the EU, it means that they can not guarantee a better agreement than this one, nor membership in NATO and the EU, but would like to have the authority in the country and “prepare the country for membership in these organizations through some kind of reforms and establish a system of respect for the Constitution and the rule of law”.

Although the referendum was consultative and the Agreement with Greece, which was ratified by the Assembly, remains in force, it will not be ratified by Greece unless changes are made to the Constitution provided for by that agreement, which requires a two-thirds majority in the Assembly of Macedonia. Since the government does not have a two-thirds majority in the Assembly, the referendum was actually conceived as a tool for persuading some of the opposition MPs to vote for a change in the Constitution.

After the announcement of the referendum’s failure by the State Election Commission due to the insufficient turnout, this task will now be significantly more difficult and the government’s majority has nothing but the extraordinary parliamentary elections to try to win enough parliamentary seats in order to change the Constitution and to implement the agreement with Greece.

The extraordinary parliamentary election in Macedonia is imposed for a number of other reasons. First, after the eleven years of the rule of Gruevski’s regime, it turned out that when he occupied all the relevant institutions in the country and overemployed the public administration, the judiciary and the police, he introduced such mechanisms for the protection of their mandates and positions that without a two thirds majority in the Assembly they provide for the further staying of those positions and their abuse for party purposes. In other words, Gruevski and his legal experts made Macedonia a captive state, so, after his departure from power, it would remain a blocked state that is subject to constant blackmail by the opposition, and in which it is impossible to conduct serious political and personnel reforms without a two-thirds majority in Assembly.
Hence, Macedonia’s key problem is that “Gruevism” as a kind of political and economic banditry is not defeated, despite the change of power.

The new government succumbed to blackmail from the remnants of Gruevism in a number of areas in order to demonstrate a will for national unity and to reach a consensus on important issues of national interest.

It is obvious that this becomes a brake on achieving the key promises and goals of the new government. And if that does not provide a majority in the Assembly for a change of the Constitution and for membership in NATO and the EU, it can be removed only by the snap extraordinary parliamentary election in which the coalition for European Macedonia and the ultra-right and populist minority in the country will compete.

In such elections, it can no longer hide its weak support behind citizens who have long emigrated from the country, but still appear on the voter lists, and behind those who are disappointed and who do not vote in any election. The Coalition for European Macedonia should not be afraid of VMRO-DPMNE’s blackmail to boycott the elections if its demands were not accepted. On the contrary. This time, no one’s request and blackmail should be accepted. They should be defeated in the name of the future of Macedonia and in the name of lasting peace in the Balkans, and as a condition for starting serious reforms and changes in society.