A visibly deflated Zoran Zaev appeared before his and DUI supporters in Tetovo to ask the voters that they reverse the first round punishment they handed to his candidate Stevo Pendarovski, who lost about 200.000 votes compared to the 2017 municipal elections.

It is true that we fell. We hear your message. But the votes didn’t go to the opposition, to Mickoski or Siljanovska. Voters stayed home, and waited to see if we will hear their message. The message is heard. We will correct our failures, said Zaev, insisting that he is not a “Murto” – a reference to the saying that all parties act the same when they assume power and forget the promises they made while in the opposition.

Zaev promised an “operation broom” – mass removals of party officials who have disappointed the voters – but he gave few specifics and avoided rocking his coalition boat ahead of the second round on May 5th. This has prompted party supporters and opponents alike to go into overdrive, listing cases of nepotism or corruption from mid level SDSM officials and asking that they are the first to go.

Zaev was joined in Albanian majority Tetovo by Edmond Ademi, one of the two senior ethnic Albanian officials in his party. Ademi asked the voters to believe in social-democracy and the concept of “one society” – Zaev’s code word for accepting more and more concessions toward Albanian national interests in Macedonia.

The Albanian wing in SDSM is in an open confrontation with DUI, the large ethnic Albanian party, which supports Stevo Pendarovski for President, but also feels cheated as SDSM makes inroads toward its base and tries to take over as many of its voters as it can.