Without much debate, Macedonian MPs unanimously voted for the dissolution of Parliament Wednesday and for holding early parliamentary elections, the third successive early general elections since 2006. Parliament Speaker Trajko Veljanoski is expected Thursday to call the early elections for 27 April together with the second round of the presidential vote.

The speeches of the leaders of the parliamentary groups, who reiterated their well-known positions to whether it is necessary to hold early general elections in Macedonia, dominated the parliamentary debate Thursday. Speaker Veljanoski said after the vote that all 117 MPs voted for dissolution of Parliament and added he was convinced that during their two-year mandate the MPs succeeded in raising the country’s democratic capacity, which induced ironic remarks from the opposition MPs in the light of the parliamentary incident of 24 December 2012 when they were forced out of Parliament.