English
Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski announced the removal from office of Hakim Ramadani, head of the municipal inspection bureau, who is also the VLEN party candidate for Mayor of the ethnically divided municipality of Brvenica near Tetovo. Ramadani made extreme nationalist comments after the first round of the elections, which was won by the VMRO-DPMNE candidate Jovica Ilievski.
VMRO and VLEN have a cooperation agreement in the local elections in a number of major municipalities, in a coalition aimed against DUI, but Brvenica is one of the places where they were confronted with each other. After the election, Ramadani tore down his party banners and raised the Albanian flag, and urged all Albanians, primarily DUI voters, to support him against the ethnic Macedonian VMRO candidate. Ramadani said that the Albanians are the masters in that part of the country and called it “an Albanian municipality”, before heading to Germany with his DUI “opponent” to jointly urge Albanian emigrants from the area to fly back and vote in the second round of the elections.
I regret what Jovica’s opponent said in his excited condition. I don’t know if it was a bad moment for him, but I think he made a serious mistake, primarily for the candides of his party that are competing in Struga, in Debar, in other municipalities. It was a selfish move on his part. First he will lose in Brvenica, and then he will be removed from his position, said Mickoski during a visit to Brvenica, where he blasted the VLEN candidate for his comments, and reminded VLEN on a number of remaining serious races where they need help from VMRO to beat the DUI candidates
“Anyone who speaks about the future of our shared Macedonia is welcome. But anyone who doesn’t think well for the Macedonians or the Albnaians is not welcome. I’m convinced that this will be recognized here in Brvenica and that such policies will be rejected with large margins, Mickopski said.
This move, as well as the call by Tetovo Mayor Bilal Kasami that his supporters should vote for the DUI candidate Fatmir Dehari in Kicevo – and against the VMRO candidate, angered Mickoski who reminded VLEN that they benefited greatly from VMRO votes in the first round of the mayoral elections. VLEN did not endorse a candidate in Kicevo, but gave indirect support to the VMRO candidate by condemned Dehari for staying in the race even after a major sexual abuse scandal that erupted ahead of the elections. About Brvenica, VLEN issued a statement saying that their candidates did not use hate speech in the campaign.
