Prime Minister Zoran Zaev expressed hope that his predecessor Branko Crvenkovski will not form a new party and divide SDSM up ahead of the key October municipal elections. Crvenkovski, who is SDSM founder and former Prime Minister and President, was politically inactive since 2013, but early this year he called on the party officials to remove Zaev from office because of Zaev’s announced readiness to accept Bulgarian claims on Macedonian national identity and history.
Crvenkovski quickly received the support of numerous former top party officials, but Zaev managed to keep the party largely in check, until a few weeks ago, when his key deputy Radmila Sekerinska announced she is leaving her party office. This was followed up by media reports that Crvenkovski plans to form a new party, and has already began putting together lists of candidates in some of the cities, which could badly divide SDSM ahead of the elections.
Crvenkovski can’t be anything else other than an SDSM man. I don’t believe in these stories that Crvenkovski will form a party. You should ask him. SDSM showed serious unity while in opposition and in power and we will continue like that. We will be wise and united at the municipal elections and will offer the most quality available candidates, Zaev said when asked about the announcements of a challenge from Crvenkovski.
Lokalno.mk, a news site close to SDSM, quoted an unnamed SDSM official today who is also expressing hope that a split won’t emerge before the election.
We don’t believe that these speculations are correct. SDSM is different from other parties in that we allow differences of opinion, which makes us the most democratic party in the way we operate. We remain the public favorite for the elections, Lokalno quoted the unnamed SDSM official.
Comments are closed for this post.