Opposition leader Hristijan Mickoski accused Prime Minister Zoran Zaev of trying to maintain the Special Special Prosecutor’s Office as a tool of political persecution in the on-going talks about re-organizing the state prosecutor’s service.

VMRO submitted over 60 amendments to the proposed law, but Zaev insisted he hasn’t seen them yet and was evasive when asked whether the Government will accept the proposals from the opposition.

If you really cared about the future of the Republic of Macedonia, you would have submitted the draft law in December or January, and we would have discussed it. You proposed it a week ago, and now you insist that it is adopted until April 1st. While we try to have a principled approach, you come at us with a “take it or leave it” offer, said Mickoski.

The law would turn the SPO, which was supposed to be a temporary institution, turned into a permanent part of the state prosecutor’s service, and Zaev insists on keeping the hand-picked prosecutors who paved the way for his take-over of power in Macedonia by initiating dozens of criminal cases almost exclusively against VMRO officials. Zaev even named Katica Janeva, but also some of the lower level SPO prosecutors by name during his TV interview with Mickoski on Tuesday evening, as people who should be kept in the institution because “major investments were made in them”.

You should just say it outright, that you need the SPO to use it as a tool of pressure against the opposition. You don’t care about justice, we saw you dispense amnesties to select defendants in the Parliament, Mickoski responded, evoking the law on partial amnesty which Zaev negotiated with three former VMRO members of Parliament who he blackmailed in order to get them to support the name change.

Mickoski asked that the SPO is merged with the existing organized crime department and that they continue to cover cases from the period when VMRO formed the Government, but that they must also look into the actions of the current Government, as well as of previous SDSM led Governments.

Let’s look into the case of the sale of the public energy system, let’s look into who allowed the Macedonian Telekom to maintain its monopoly position. This is what the citizens want to hear. You acknowledge that governments are the source of corruption in any country, let’s look into yours, because what you say is concerning, said Mickoski in his debate with Zaev.

Zaev insisted that VMRO must accept the SPO law because failure to adopt it would endanger Macedonia’s invitation to open European Union accession talks, which is expected during the European Council this July. Despite the traumatic name change, the recommendation to open the talks is still not assured, Zaev told the public, to which Mickoski reminded him that he already organized public celebrations last July, insisting that opening the talks is assured in July 2019.

Remember the selfie you took in the plane returning from the Council, when you told us that the recommendation is approved? When did you lie to the public, then, or now? Mickoski asked Zaev.

Zaev’s comments made it clear that, if he fails to reach agreement with VMRO, he will use the same option he used during the name change process, when a total of nine opposition members of Parliament were targetted with selective criminal charges and bribes to get them to vote in favor of the “new name”.