The SDSM party issued a statement in response to its former, and former leader Prime Minister and President Branko Crvenkovski, who called on current leader and PM Zoran Zaev to step down after his surrender to Bulgaria on all positions of history and national identity.

We leave it to the citizens to evaluate the statement from former President Branko Crvenkovski, who spent years in silence, having no position on matters of importance to the country and the nation. The citizens and SDSM members will decide whether this is a principled way to act to his own party and its leadership. SDSM will not speculate on Crvenkovski’s personal motives for his statement, that comes at a crucial moment when the entire country needs to show reason and accomplish the strategic goals it set for itself since independence, which includes EU membership, SDSM said in its press release.

The party, and a number of current officials close to Zaev insisted that the comments Zaev made during his BGNES interview, are the positions of the party and the Government, despite open protests from many current and former party officials, including Crvenkovski, and a milder statement of reservation from current President Stevo Pendarovski.

SDSM and the citizens chose a European future. We chose to make courageous and patriotic decisions and to pragmatically move the Macedonian state and our entire Macedonian people toward meeting the strategic goals in NATO and EU. These positions were formed within the party and its institutions and these are the positions of the state, based on the trust received from the citizens at the past elections, the ruling party added in its press release.