Prosecutor Fatime Fetai, from the disgraced Special Prosecutor’s Office, was laughed out of court today when she asked that a hearing is postponed.

The continued work of the SPO office, whose main prosecutor Katica Janeva is in detention, is uncertain as Janeva is trying a legally dubious maneuver to give her case files to the OJO/PPO office of state prosecutors with orders sent from prison. As the SPO prosecuted almost exclusively officials and activists of the opposition VMRO-DPMNE party, the Zaev Government wants to be able to continue its campaign of persecution against the opposition now that they’ve lost Janeva’s service. Her prosecutors attempted to continue presenting their cases in court even after her arrest, but as they are now ordered by Janeva to give their files to OJO, Fetai today asked for a postponement in one of the few cases involving non-VMRO defendants – in it several lower level DUI party officials are suspected of electoral fraud. Fetai said that the case is being transferred to the Public Prosecutor Ljubomir Joveski and therefore she can’t present it today. In response, the judge asked Fetai “who is now leading the case”? This prompted laughter from the defense attorneys.

The once outspoken prosecutor, who was best known for publicly threatening her defendants, testily replied “don’t laugh, maybe I will be back on the case”. Despite the major scandal, involving widespread abuse of office, Janeva’s prosecutors demand that they are allowed to return to the OJO office and even assigned to the cases they ran while working for Janeva.