Relations between the conservative VMRO-DPMNE and the left-wing populist Levica party deteriorated further over the past few days.

Levica launched a social media campaign against VMRO, as it tries to position itself as the main defender of Macedonian national identity. It cited attempts by the Zaev Government to adopt an extremely lax citizenship law that would allow Albanians with few ties to the country to gain citizenship, as well as the demand from one of Zaev’s Albanian coalition partners BESA to add the ethnic designation in the identity cards as evidence of the “defacing of the Macedonian nation”. But instead of training fire on Zaev and SDSM, Levica is just as likely to accuse VMRO over these proposals, insisting that it is only the two Levica members of Parliament who are causing ruckus in Parliament over this – despite the fact that often the two parties ultimately join forces to block Zaev’s legislative proposals. VMRO-DPMNE is mildly supportive of the second law, as it would allow not just Albanians but also Macedonians to state their ethnicity in the identity cards – a move that Greece strongly opposes and that could cause cracks in Zaev’s coaliiton with BESA – potentially even destabilizing his Government.

VMRO member of Parliament Brane Petrusevski, who was the target of unseemly comments from a semi-official social media account of Levica’s leader Dimitar Apasiev, reminded the populist party of its support for Zaev’s Colored Revolution and the Special Prosecutor’s Office – two key instruments that were used to remove VMRO from power and to install Zaev, who is now imposing a name and identity change on the Macedonians.

Apasiev was an adviser in the criminal SPO office, he advised prosecutor Katica Janeva and stood side by side with Zaev. He now portrays himself as Che Guevara, but Levica actually works to divide the opposition camp and with that – help Zaev, Petrusevski said.