VMRO-DPMNE offered to the other parties in Parliament to break the deadlock over the constitutional amendments requested by Bulgaria by adopting a Croatian style Preamble. The Croatian Constitution was cited often by proponents of amending the Constitution and adding the Bulgarian nation in it, because it includes a large number of minorities, and this was pointed to VMRO as this party opposes the change.

But VMRO now notes that the Croatian Constitution clearly marks Croatia as the nation state of the Croats and the other nations are named as minorities, not as “parts of their respective nations” as is the case in Macedonia. This is a difficult pill to swallow for the Albanian parties, who do not want Macedonia declared the nation state of the Macedonians.

Dimitar Kovacevski and Bujar Osmani cited the Croatian Constitution as an acceptable model. But now when we agreed with them, they are silent. We call on DUI and SDSM, as self-declared pro-European parties, to accept changing the Constitution in line with the Constitution of an EU member state, said VMRO spokeswoman Marija Miteva.

Macedonia started off with a Preamble similar to that of Croatia, but watered down the role of the Macedonian nation in the Preamble twice, after the 2001 civil war and after the 2017 Colored Revolution. The request made by VMRO would restore some of the concessions Macedonians made toward the Albanians and other minorities.