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Roundup: Macedonia's DUI affirms support for SDSM-led gov't, ruling party warns of turmoil

Xinhua, February 26, 2017 Adjust font size:

The Social Democratic Union (SDSM) led by Zoran Zaev has managed to secure the support of the ethnic Albanian party, Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), thus paving the way the formation of a new government in Macedonia, local media reported Saturday.

On Friday night, the spokesperson of DUI Bujar Osmani told reporters that the party supported the formation of a SDSM-led government although DUI might not be part of it.

Earlier, SDSM and DUI had agreed on a law guaranteeing broader use of the Albanian language across Macedonia.

During the last weeks, Zoran Zaev of SDSM has been trying to secure the signatures of the majority of parliamentary seats.

SDSM garnered 49 seats in the snap general elections of Dec. 11, 2016 while the party needed 61 votes to be mandated for the creation of a new government.

Now that he has secured the ten signatures of DUI, he is expected to make a move forward towards asking the president Gjorge Ivanov to give him the mandate to form a government.

Although the officials of both parties declared Saturday that the talks are still underway in terms of the government formation, it is seems that it is more likely to have a SDSM-led government soon.

Zaev declared two days ago that he would be able to form the government in two weeks.

The fact that the ethnic Albanian party run by Ali Ahmeti agreed to support Zaev spurred strong reactions Saturday from the VMRO-DPMNE camp.

The leader of VMRO-DPMNE Nikola Gruevski warned Saturday that Macedonia was at risk while he vowed to protect national interests.

The situation seems critical as the party militants of VMRO-DPMNE warned that Macedonia could go again through a period of instability.

According to Gruevski, SDSM and DUI have broken the "Winner-Winner" agreement established in 2007.

According to this deal, there is a political consensus in Macedonia under which the first party of majority Slavic speaking voters is expected to form the governing coalition with the first party of minority Albanian speaking voters, which make up more than 30 percent of the population.

In this regard, VMRO-DPMNE winning 51 seats was the one that should form coalition with DUI winning 10 seats, according to VMRO-DPMNE.

Albanian parties' platform and attempts to make the Albanian language official redefined Macedonia against all principles of a multi-ethnic state, VMRO-DPMNE said Saturday in a statement.

According to the statement, the SDSM proposal to make Macedonia bilingual was unacceptable, dangerous and damaging to national interests. Endit