Even without the epidemic, Macedonia was heading for an economic crisis, with the budget deficit for the first quarter of 2020 twice larger than what it normally is, said opposition leader Hristijan Mickoski.

Mickoski pointed to the fact that deficit spending for Q1 is at 120 million EUR, while in a normal quarter, the spending is evenly distributed at around 50-60 million EUR.

There is no other way to describe this than pilfering. The economy was literally being robbed over the past three months of the yaer, in an attempt to placate voters for the elections that were planned on April 12. They spent 120 million EUR more than what they collected in revenue, trying to paint a shining picture of a growing economy, Mickoski said.

And the spending overwhelmingly went to transfers meant to buy votes. Mickoski pointed to the fact that in 2017, in the same first quarter of the year, the Government spent 19 percent of the planned deficit but built 21 percent of the planned capital investments in infrastructure. The numbers began to get worse with each passing year under SDSM, and this year, the Government spent 43 percent of the planned deficit in the first quarter, and built just 8,5 percent of the planned investments for the whole of the year.

Mickoski predicted that, with the expected 4 percent GDP drop for the year, Macedonia is now certain to have a budget deficit of 700 million EUR. He said that the Government largely rejected his proposal to use the short term bond issues by the Central Bank to help the economy and now Macedonia will have to look outside to cover the gaping deficit.