Macedonian President Gjorge Ivanov appealed for fair and democratic elections that would celebrate democracy and show that Macedonia’s place is in the democratic world.
“I would like to send a message to our citizens to respect the country and all that we have achieved in the past 20 years of independence. And we have to prove that on Sunday, on the election day,” President Ivanov said in Rome where he attended the celebration of the 150th anniversary of Italy’s unification.
On Sunday, he added, we should celebrate democracy because on that day our citizens will vote for those who will represent them in Parliament over the next four years and will have to take decisions about what Macedonia should achieve and that is the strategic goals of joining NATO and the EU. President Ivanov expects peaceful and fair elections, because, as he said, it is improper after 20 years of democracy to take actions in elections that do no good to those who come after us.
“Let us show everybody we are a mature democracy that belongs to the democratic world, that is to say, NATO and the EU,” the Macedonian president emphasized.
The election campaign ends tonight at midnight and the 24-hour silence before the early parliamentary elections on 5 June begins. The parties, coalitions and independent candidates running in these elections have been presenting their programs and candidates over the past 20 days trying to win the citizens’ trust.
The vote Sunday begins at 7 in the morning and ends at 7 in the evening. A total of 1,821,122 voters are eligible to vote. They will cast ballots at 2976 polling stations for 1,679 candidates on 18 lists. For the first time, three of the 123 MPs will be representing the diaspora. In the three constituencies abroad – Europe and Africa, South and North America and Australia and Asia - 24 candidates’ lists have been submitted on which 7,258 Macedonian citizens that reported with the Macedonian embassies and consulates will vote. The diaspora vote will take place a day before the elections in the Republic of Macedonia, on 4 June. On Saturday, 2,222 detainees and convicts, 407 internally displaced people, as the well as the ill will also be able to exercise their right to vote.
The order of candidates determined by a draw at the State Election Commission is the same in all constituencies. Demokracia e Re is ranked 1st, the Party of United Democrats for Macedonia (PODEM) 2nd, the Social Democratic Union (SDU) 3rd, the Democratic Union of Albanians (BDSH) 4th, the coalition led by VMRO-DPMNE 5th, VMRO-NP 6th, BDI 7th, PDSH 8th, Dostoinstvo 9th, the coalition led by SDSM 10th, BDK 11th, LDP 12th, SDPM 13th, Democratic Right 14th, European Party for Macedonia 15th, PPD 16th, RDK 17th and United for Macedonia 18th.
The parliamentary elections will be monitored by 7,830 observers accredited by the State Election Commission, 7,341 of whom home and 489 foreign. The foreign observers consist of 234 observers of the OSCE/ODIHR, 47 of the Parliamentary Assembly of the OSCE, 39 of the US Embassy, 20 of the delegation of the European Commission, and 16 of the Council of Europe. There will also be monitors from the embassies of France, Slovenia, Great Britain, Russia, the Czech Republic, Austria, Turkey, China, Hungary, Croatia, Italy and the Slovak Republic in Skopje, the Central Election Commission of Kosovo and the International Crisis Group.
Most of the home observers are from the civil association MOST (4,466) and the remaining are from six more non-governmental organizations. The State Election Commission said that all preparations for the elections have been completed and the voting material has been provided to the bodies responsible for carrying out the vote.
