Bujar Osmani, the Foreign Affairs Minister of the Republic of North Macedonia (RNM) informed that the headcount of the diplomatic service ends today, but the online census of the RNM nationals living abroad continues. The number of registered people who live in the diaspora has exceeded 60.000, and most of the people registered live in Switzerland – 16.000, Germany – 10.000, and Italy 6.000. The response rates in the USA, Canada and Australia are the lowest and according to Osmani, the reasons aren’t certain.
“Maybe it’s the distance and insufficient information. But, it’s important that this following period is used to give those people information and to inform them that the process of registering is easy and that it won’t take more than 15 minutes of their time,” Osmani said in a press conference today.
According to him, it is too early to state that there is a low response to the census in the Diaspora, since the process is at its start.
“There are 35 more days for the diaspora citizens to register themselves and even 30 more days for their acquaintances to registered them, if they have their data,” said Osmani.
Regarding the problems with the census, in connection with the registering of the Citizen Personal Identification Numbers (CPIN) of the nationals from the diaspora, Osmani stressed that the most common mistake was the selection of the country. Apparently, when entering that number, the Republic of North Macedonia is the country that should be stated, not the country where they live. If the name of the country where they currently live is stated, then the CPIN cannot be entered, until under “Country” writes “Republic of North Macedonia”.
The Foreign Affairs Minister stated there is no information on whether part of the diaspora is boycotting the census as a result of the call from the opposition, but that cannot be excluded. Since personal calls cannot be made for each citizen to register themselves.
