North Macedonia’s parliamentary and presidential elections saw a right-wing anti-Europe party return to power. The backdrop is one of a long-running and controversial process towards the country joining the European Union, which has seen the government make compromises to neighbouring states some find unacceptable. After a polarising election, the concern is that the incoming government will double down on its populist politics of division and resume the attacks on civil society and independent media that characterised its last period in power.

The old guard is back in North Macedonia, with the former ruling party – the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization – Democratic Party for Macedonian National Unity (VMRO-DPMNE) – returning to parliamentary and presidential power.

Long the country’s dominant political force, the right-wing VMRO-DPMNE had been out of power since 2016. But in May, the political alliance it leads came first in the parliamentary election, taking 58 of 120 seats in the Sobranie, the country’s assembly. In the presidential election runoff, held at the same time, its candidate triumphed with 61 per cent of the vote. In both cases the centre-left and pro-Europe Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDSM), which had led the governing coalition and held the presidency, came a distant second. In the Sobranie, its political alliance lost 28 of its 46 seats on only 14 per cent of the vote.

VMRO-DPMNE made its way back to office by harnessing widespread public frustration over the country’s attempt to join the European Union (EU), which has moved slowly, been dogged by controversy and forced the government to make numerous compromises. SDSM stood on a platform of rapid constitutional reform to accelerate progress, but VMRO-DPMNE, while claiming to support EU membership, opposes further changes. Its return signals a turn away from Europe, and a likely worsening of civil society conditions.

Rocky road towards the EU

North Macedonia has been an official candidate to join the EU since 2005. Negotiations are always lengthy – the last state to join was Croatia in 2013 following a 10-year process – but North Macedonia’s road has been particularly bumpy. Before it could begin formal negotiations, it had to change the country’s name. Any existing EU member can block a non-member’s accession, and Greece stood in North Macedonia’s way. The country shared its name with a region of Greece, which the Greek government saw as implying a territorial claim.

The hugely controversial issue brought extensive protests as name-change negotiations reached their conclusion in 2018. A referendum intended to approve the change failed when a boycott left turnout well below the level required, despite overwhelming support from those who voted. VMRO-DPMNE had urged its supporters to reject the deal. The referendum was non-binding, and parliament went on to change the constitution regardless in January 2019.

Then Bulgaria intervened. Nationalists in both countries see the other as part of their historical territory, and recognition of the Macedonian language is controversial, with many Bulgarians refusing to acknowledge it as anything more than a dialect of theirs. The Bulgarian government insists its North Macedonian counterpart must do more to prevent the spread of anti-Bulgarian sentiments and protect the rights of the country’s Bulgarian minority. This heated issue, inflamed by much disinformation, helped force a political crisis in Bulgaria in 2022 when the government collapsed, with one of the coalition partners walking out in part over its disagreement with policies towards North Macedonia.

The two sides finally struck a deal to allow North Macedonia to begin Eu negotiations in July 2022, but disputes still flare and in 2023 Bulgaria’s parliament warned it could halt the process again. North Macedonia’s outgoing government failed to win the two-thirds parliamentary majority needed to change the constitution to recognise the Bulgarian minority.

Relations with Bulgaria remain a huge issue in North Macedonia and played their part in the campaign. Some think the government has gone too far in compromising, and VMRO-DPMNE characterised the SDSM-led government’s actions as a surrender.

Even after all this, North Macedonia would still need to pass 33 chapters of EU law, a huge legislative programme, and hope to avoid any further vetoes, before it could finally join. That would take years. As a consequence of all the delays and compromises, public support for joining the EU has fallen.

Voices from the frontline

Darko Duridanski is executive director of the Independent Trade Union of Journalists and Media Workers.

 

It was the primacy of a foreign policy issue in this campaign that gave the presidential election an unusual importance. The victory of the right-wing party in both presidential and parliamentary elections is expected to have regional repercussions. A right-wing government will likely prioritise other issues over resolving outstanding conflicts crucial for advancing negotiations with the EU. Under this leadership, North Macedonia’s regional alliances may be looking at a period of uncertainty and stagnation.

Disinformation has been pervasive. A significant obstacle is the polarisation of the media landscape, which shapes how people receive information about political parties and their programmes and policies. Polarisation is particularly acute online. It often leads to unprofessional journalistic practices and makes it challenging for people to access accurate information, particularly during elections.

The government’s efforts to combat disinformation during the election primarily consisted of proposed measures on paper, with little implementation, and therefore yielded limited results. There have been civil society efforts to tackle the issue, including through fact-checking and digital literacy campaigns, but their impact has also been limited.

A comprehensive and sustained strategy to combat disinformation is needed to ensure voters can make an informed choice.

 

This is an edited extract of our conversation with Darko. Read the full interview here.

A troubling return

VMRO-DPMNE led the government for a decade from 2006 to 2016, with Nikola Gruevski prime minister throughout. The party also held the presidency, a less powerful role, from 2009 to 2019.

But Gruevski and his party fell from grace in 2016 amid allegations that he and many more of his party’s politicians were involved in a wiretapping scandal that affected over 20,000 people. As well as extensive surveillance, leaked recordings implicated the government in corruption and judicial interference. Mass protests followed. VMRO-DPMNE still came first in the 2016 parliamentary election but couldn’t form a coalition, so power passed to an SDSM-led government. SDSM retained power in the 2020 election, and its candidate won the presidency in 2019.

Gruevski’s fall was swift. In 2018, he was sentenced to two years in prison for corruption, but before he was due to go to jail he fled to Hungary, where the government of his authoritarian friend Viktor Orbán granted him political asylum and continues to refuse to extradite him. Further convictions followed, including a seven-year sentence for money laundering and illegal acquisition of property.

From exile, Gruevski has continued to criticise the government that replaced him. And while relations with VMRO-DPMNE’s current leader are hostile, ideologically, VMRO-DPMNE still carries his fingerprints and the networks Gruevski developed among supportive media, the private sector and criminal groups remain. Under Gruevski, the party took a nationalist, pro-Russia and anti-west direction, promoting identity politics that hark back to the ancient Macedonian Empire.

For civil society, this makes the election results concerning news. Conditions deteriorated during VMRO-DPMNE’s decade in power. The party’s identity politics fuelled a polarised political and media environment. Nationalist groups physically attacked several journalists. Civil society leaders were among those the state subjected to illegal surveillance. Using the same tactics as Orbán, the government hurled abuse at civil society groups receiving funding from Open Society Foundations, accusing them of colluding with foreign governments. It subjected critical organisations to financial audits and raided their offices. Civil society also voiced concern about heavy-handed policing of protests and impunity for police abuses.

The election was held in an atmosphere of intense polarisation and proliferating disinformation, some originating in Russia, which doesn’t want any more countries joining the EU. There’s now a risk of a return to the politics of division, which would bring a resumption of attacks on civil society and independent media. VMRO-DPMNE has already made clear it’s looking for confrontation. New president Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova upset Greece by using North Macedonia’s old name during her inauguration ceremony.

The EU impasse wasn’t the only reason voters were unhappy. People haven’t seen any progress in combating corruption or improving economic conditions and public services. In country after country, there’s a broader pattern of electoral volatility as voters, unhappy with the performance of incumbents in difficult economic conditions, shop around for anything that looks different. Populist and nationalist parties – even long-established ones such as VMRO-DPMNE – are doing best at making an emotional connection with voters’ anger, offering deceptively simple answers and promising change.

For civil society, that means there’s now work to be done in depolarising the debate, building consensus and defending civic freedoms: a tall order, but a vital one, for which it’ll need a lot of support.

OUR CALLS FOR ACTION

  • The new government should commit to respecting civic freedoms and engaging constructively with civil society.
  • The European Union should urge the new government to respect civic freedoms and support North Macedonian civil society.
  • North Macedonian civil society and independent media should work to combat and rebut disinformation.

For interviews or more information, please contact research@civicus.org

Cover photo by Robert Atanasovski/AFP via Getty Images