We have a plan how to make a billion EUR available so that the citizens are not as affected by the coming economic crisis and they would be, said VMRO-DPMNE President Hristijan Mickoski. His proposal comes a day after SDSM party leader Zoran Zaev announced his plan, to greatly reduce public sector wages over two months in order to prop up hard hit private industries.

On top of the 600 million EUR in loans that are being secured from the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and foreign commercial banks we can secure additional 400 million EUR in bonds through the Finance Ministry. The banks are currently greatly liquid and have about 420 million EUR in short term bonds issued by the Central Bank. These funds are largely left out of the economy. Through the Macedonian Reconstruction and Development Bank these funds could be used to support small and mid sized businesses that have liquidity issues. With these funds, we can reach the figure of a billion EUR that would be sufficient to cushion the blow to the economy, Mickoski said.