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Roundup: Macedonian speaker takes over office, calling for swift gov't formation

Xinhua, May 3, 2017 Adjust font size:

The new Speaker of Macedonia's Parliament, Talat Xhaferi, on Wednesday officially entered his office where he received in a meeting the European Union ambassador to Skopje, Samuel Zbogar, the parliament's press office said.

A day before, he was not allowed to enter his office by the MPs of the VMRO-DPMNE while former speaker Trajko Veljanoski said Xhaferri was elected in an illegal way.

VMRO-DPMNE MPs contested his election, saying that the Constitution and Parliaments rulebook were breached.

However, in the meeting with Ambassador Zbogar, the newly-elected speaker said that he would focus his activities on bolstering democratic processes and fulfilling the principles of parliamentary democracy in the functioning of the country's Parliament, the press statement said.

On the other hand, he called for a swift formation of a new government.

This process should be followed by joining all of our forces to respect, first and foremost, the independence of all branches of government so as to work for the well­being of all the citizens in the Republic of Macedonia and to meet our strategic ambitions NATO and EU membership, Xhaferri told media.

EU ambassador congratulated Talat Xhaferi on his election, noting that with this, the Parliament and the Republic of Macedonia were resuming the process of full integration into Euro-­Atlantic structures.

He also said that a lot of time had been wasted and that the process of the reformation of institutions must continue.

Zbogar expressed EU's readiness to cooperate with the parliament for the necessary reforms that the country needed in order to move forward.

After this meeting, there was a reaction from VMRO­DPMNE as this party MP Dragan Danev said at a press conference that the party considered Talat Xhaferi's appointment as Speaker of the Parliament to be illegitimate.

Meantime, three Members of the European parliament, Eduard Kukan, Knut Fleckenstein and Ivo Vajgl issued Wednesday a joint press statement in which they warned that the failure to form a government in FYROM may have serious consequences for the country, as media here reported.

According to media reports, the three MEPs noted that the failure to form a new government had consequences and the European parliament might postpone the voting of the resolution for the country.

They also called on Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov to respect the will of the parliament and allow the end of this crisis, noting that further delays in creating a new government would have irreparable consequences. Endit