Today the ambassadors of the US and the European Union, Jess Bailey and Aivo Orav have to make an assessment on whether there are conditions for fair and democratic elections. One of the conditions set for the parties was to reach an agreement for the media, but such a thing did not happen yesterday.
As things stand at present, Parliament should dissolve on Wednesday, February 24, and in two months , on April 24, elections should be held.
As to whether any of the dates will be changed, none of the parties have revealed anything.
According to VMRO-DPMNE, all conditions have been met for fair elections, while the SDSM say the most two important conditions have not been met, and they are – the cleansing of the Voters’ List, and reforms in the media.
Ivo Kotevski, Director of the Centre for Communications of VMRO-DPMNE, said his party would continue to act as before.
“We are always ready and open to negotiations and until now we have always been constructive. Our party will continue to act in accordance with the Przhino Agreement, the laws and the Constitution”, said today Kotevski.
Peter Shilegov the spokesman for SDSM said that according to them, the conditions for free and fair elections were not met. He reiterated the statement of the leader of the opposition party that they will “not be watching the elections on TV”.
“The Voters’ list should be cleansed by March 5, which means it should be ready in 15 days. We have not come to an agreement over media reforms, how can there be free and fair elections. We will adhere to our view, that we will not participate in these kind of elections, and we won’t be watching them on television”, says Shilegov.
