The collaboration between Zoran Zaev and Radmila Sekerinska is coming to an end. The two co-led the SDSM party since 2013, through the Colored Revolution, together they grabbed power in 2017 and imposed a name change and a list of humiliating concessions on Macedonian national identity issues, and are now mired in constant corruption scandals and failures of their foreign policy.

In this light, Sekerinska decided not to seek another term as co-leader of the party and was promptly replaced by Sanja Lukarevska.
SDSM is still processing the change and it’s early to tell how it would reflect on the party. Meanwhile, an old video was shared online, showing Zaev endorsing Sekerinska when it was her turn to try her hand at leading the party in 2008. Sekerinska ousted former leader Vlado Buckovski but her term ended abruptly, after she suffered one of the worst electoral defeats in 2008, to the resurgent VMRO-DPMNE led by Nikola Gruevski.

In the video, Zaev mangles a Serbian slang expression, saying that he will stand behind Sekerinska “with my hand and head”, and I will “stand behind the future Macedonian Prime Minister Radmila Sekerinska”.