The Social Democrats are going to wait till the end with their proposal for president of the State Election Commission (DIK), who should be reported as a candidate at the competition by Saturday, Dnevnik reports. Tanja Altandzieva, currently a member of the Commission proposed by SDSM is speculated to be the candidate for president. Her advantage is the fact that she is experienced in this field but a problem would be that her position as member would then be vacated and filling it would take additional time. In that case, the impression will be that SDSM wishes to buy time again until the elections. That is not our goal, party sources say, which is why other candidates are being considered as well.

The possible candidates for president of DIK include also Renata Deskoska-Treneska, member of SDSM’s executive committee, as well as other distinguished and seasoned legal professionals.

A high-ranking SDSM official says that unless Prime Minister and VMRO-DPMNE leader Nikola Gruevski demonstrates constructiveness in meeting the opposition demands, SDSM is ready to boycott the elections and all processes in their preparation. Hence SDSM expects a new leaders’ meeting to be held soon at which the leaders of the major political parties would debate all open issues.

Opposition sources say they expect the leaders’ meeting to be called by BDI leader Ali Ahmeti. If he does not call it, they expect the international community to appear in the capacity of an organizer or President Gjorge Ivanov to host it again.

BDI said Wednesday that no one had yet requested of their leader Ahmeti to organize a leaders’ meeting and did not specify if he would take that upon himself. VMRO-DPMNE say they have no information about SDSM’s expectations and point out it would not be good for Ahmeti to accept that role. They further say they are ready for a leaders’ meeting at any time at which the parties would harmonize their stances concerning the demands for early elections. In their view, SDSM should only withdraw publicly the demand for unblocking the accounts of Velija Ramkovski’s television channel and papers, considering the Government has no powers in that matter.

Another issue is the way in which the vote of the diaspora will be resolved, an opportunity afforded by the current election law.