DUI party leader Ali Ahmeti said that he had a tense conversation with Zoran Zaev in which he asked him to revoke his decision to resign as Prime Minister and SDSM leader.

It was a very tense conversation. I told Zaev that I don’t agree with his decision, with his resignation from the party or the Government. I pointed to the strong DUI position in the local elections. A year ago we won mandate to run the policies in teh country. I spoke to Zaev again today, I told him that we can reach compromise on the main issues, and he can then resign. I still call on his party to revise this hasty and baseless decision, Ahmeti said.

Ahmeti expects Zaev to honor their agreement that an ethnic Albanian candidate will lead the Government in its last year. Ahmeti also seems worried that a potential VMRO-DPMNE led coalition will cut off his DUI party from the Government for the first time since 2008.

While Zaev’s SDSM party was demolished in the local elections, winning only two major urban centers against a dozen for VMRO-DPMNE, DUI also suffered serious defeats – it lost the two largest majority Albanian cities, Tetovo and Gostivar, even as it did well in the council races. Their coalition seemed troubled yesterday, when DUI clearly did not deliver on its promise to support SDSM in the key race in Skopje, where the DUI controlled Saraj area had the lowest turnout in the entire country – below 30 percent.