With his resignation formally activated yesterday, Zoran Zaev is now trying to appoint Dimitar Kovacevski as the next party leader and possibly future Prime Minister.

Zaev is hoping that once Kovacevski is elected party leader, he will be asked to form a new Government by President Stevo Pendarovski. Zaev currently doesn’t have majority in Parliament, and only survived a vote of no confidence with the help of the apparent kidnapping of one opposition member of Parliament on the day of the vote. He is courting the small Alternative party, that could help SDSM get over the 61 threshold. This nominally opposition party said that it will ask for a hefty price to help SDSM cling on to power, and will likely drag out the negotiations and make a final decision only after SDSM elects its new leader.

SDSM spokeswoman Bogdanka Kuzeska, who was the only to address the public following the meeting, insisted that SDSM has majority in Parliament with 61 votes, but did not say who are the opposition representatives that support it. On paper, SDSM’s coalition has 59 votes, and the “kidnapped” representative Katriot Rexhepi is likely the 60th vote.