Parliament Speaker Trajko Veljanoski is going to call the local elections Friday and set the date for holding the poll on 24 March, while the leadership of governing VMRO-DPMNE is going to voice Saturday its stance to the conditions that SDSM has recently set to run in the local elections. If the reply of the governing party is negative, as it is speculated, it is almost certain that the opposition of the Macedonian political campus is going to boycott the local elections.

If, on the other hand, the opposition proposal – holding local elections simultaneously with early parliamentary elections – is accepted, Parliament will have to dissolve sometime around 24 January, which is in about two weeks’ time.

Under the election law, local elections should be held in the fourth year of the terms of office of the sitting local authorities, in the second half of March.