SDSM supporters are distributing firewood through Ohrid, in an apparent attempt to buy votes for the presidential elections this Sunday, claims VMRO-DPMNE Vice-President Aleksandar Nikoloski.

Who paid the Macedonian Forests company for these deliveries? Is it SDSM? Do they realize this is a gross violation of the electoral laws. You can buy firewood but you can’t buy the people. I guarantee you that the people you are making these deliveries to will accept the bribe but will vote against you because you got them in this miserable economic situation, where a family can’t even buy its own firewood, said Nikoloski.

SDSM are holding their campaign in Ohrid this evening, and the deliveries of wood, outside of the heating season, are seen as a clear bribery attempt. Bribing voters with firewood is a frequent tactic used in Macedonian elections.

Meanwhile Dusko Ilievski, a former SDSM activist from Bitola, accused the ruling party of organizing payments for workers in the large REK Bitola power plant and coal-mine to get them to vote for the SDSM – DUI presidential candidate Stevo Pendarovski. According to Ilievski, the REK Bitola union approved payments of financial aid to local employees this week, just in time for the elections.