Macedonia Adopts Key Election Code Amendments

The Macedonian Parliament has adopted amendments to the election act which have been the matter of vigorous discussions with the opposition in the past few months.

68 MPs out of 120 supported the new law, with the opposition boycotting the vote.

The ruling coalition of PM Nikola Gruevski's VMRO-DPMNE and the ethnic Albanian Democratic Union for Integration is expected to set June 5 as the date for general elections.

The opposition Social Democratic Union of Macedonia declared that it will take part in the elections in spite of threatening to boycott them earlier.

Macedonian Justice Minister Mihajlo Manevski has stated that the election law changes were made after long consultations with all major political factors, and incorporate proposals by NGOs and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

The political crisis in the Republic of Macedonia had worsened as talks among the major political forces brokered by the president failed to produce an agreement on holding elections.

For two months the opposition Social Democratic Union of Macedonia led by former Primer Minister and former President Branko Crvenkovski has been boycotting the world of the Parliament in Skopje.

While Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski from the VMRO-DPMNE party recently agreed on holding early elections, the Social Democratic Union has made it clear it is likely to boycott the elections as well over its demands regarding the election code.

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