1 I can’t understand how easily politicians from all over the world resign. They’re insane. The German MP from Merkel’s coalition who had taken money from VMRO-DPMNE to lobby for Gruevski resigned yesterday, just after realizing they were on his track. He didn’t wait for his name to hit the papers. Two MPs at the Parliament of Canada resigned after it was revealed they had traveled abroad, while in their country travel restrictions were in place due to the pandemic.

There’s nothing to explain there, no need for excuses, if there was a conflict of interests or there wasn’t, if it was legal or it wasn’t, were they entitled to a holiday… The party says – great, it’s good for the party, they’re gone from politics and life goes on.

Imagine if Angela Merkel came out with a statement: “I don’t know what the whole thing with the MP was, but if he took fifty thousand euros from VMRO-DPMNE it certainly wasn’t on a whim, there must have been a reason for that. And certainly he has worked the money off.” Just like our Zaev accounted for his counselor Dragi Rashkovski, who was the Secretary-General of the Government, saying that it wasn’t on a whim that he decided to buy the software for 81.000 euros following his idea, because there must have been a reason why he bought it. Besides being smart, he has ideas.

Imagine if Angela Merkel appointed the MP lobbying for Gruevski as a counselor in her Cabinet and kept clarifying the matter to the media: “Well, you can’t possibly expect us to throw the poor man out on the street. He has to work for the daily bread of his children, what happened took place in 2016, he’s already spent the money, life’s expensive in Germany.”

As for the ones in Canada, the Prime Minister’s Cabinet will issue a statement that “they don’t intend to demand their resignations because they are doing their job diligently.” And that “no one is forbidden to leave the country.” Just as Prime Minister Zaev’s Cabinet accounted for Deputy Prime Minister Ljupco Nikolovski’s trip to Dubai.

2 The only thing missing is for VMRO-DPMNE to come out with a few statements, for Antonijo Miloshoski to call a couple of press conferences and for Hristijan Mickoski to post late-night dramatic statuses on Facebook. So they could point out that the German press revealing that the MP spent money from their membership fee is an attempt to defocus the public from Zoran Zaev’s treasonous policies, Filipche’s inability to buy vaccines, the ones who died because of Covid-19, the census, Rashkovski’s software and a thousand other unimaginable disasters weighing on the mind of this miserable and wretched people.

3 Who knows how much money Gruevski and Co have taken out of the country. Who knows how much consulting services cost in Budapest.

Maybe the 80 thousand for the software following Rashkovski’s idea are nothing compared to the millions spent by Gruevski and Co. Maybe his lots of land, which were bought by others on his behalf, were “a real bargain,” while Rashkovski’s trip to Mexico was almost free of charge, so it’s not a sensation at all. Even the trip to Dubai by Deputy Prime Minister in charge of the fight against corruption Ljupco Nikolovski is not a sensation, because he is entitled to a holiday like all the other citizens. He set up an example for the start of the campaign against corruption which aims to “give rise to an appropriate social change, which is undoubtedly necessary.”

Everything’s according to the law, boss. Here, the laws written on paper are the ones that apply. The moral laws do not.

4 It’s not really about Dubai, or Mexico. Even if they went to Halkidiki in these times of troubled times, it would be the same. It’s also not about the money, nor how expensive or cheap it is. And it’s definitely not about the fact that “everyone is entitled to a holiday.”

It’s simple. It’s about setting up an example. When you’re in public office, especially in a high position, the politically right thing to do is to show solidarity with the citizens during difficult times. It’s not exactly right to go abroad because – “everyone is entitled to a holiday” in the thick of the pandemic’s third wave, when people are begging for a check-up and a hospital bed, jobs are lost, doctors and nurses are physically and mentally exhausted, weddings are called off, you can’t go to a funeral to pay your last respects to the deceased and when we can’t catch our breath.

How are we to take Deputy Prime Minister Nikolovski seriously when he says that “there can be no compromise with the citizens’ health” and that “there can be no compromise with the fight against corruption,” if at such a difficult moment we felt betrayed and abandoned. This is like having someone gravely ill in your family, and someone else who’s lost their job and have no salary, but you don’t give a damn and you act to your heart’s content because “everyone is entitled to a holiday.”

No one is forbidden from having fun and spending their salary as they please. But, if you’re in public office, people expect you to act as a role model, especially during a crisis such as this one. You don’t set up an example by writing statuses on Facebook about how many tonnes of expired butter were seized by the inspectors and how many pubs were closed for not complying with the Covid safety measures. You set up an example with your behavior. Even in your free time.

At the end of the day, to make mistakes is human. And it would’ve been better for Ljupco to apologize and say “I made a mistake” than to let the party bootlickers defend him. That was even more devastating. As for Rashkovski, I don’t even expect him to apologize.

5 It looks really bad when five men pose in an empty sports hall at a volleyball match, having entered there just because they’re party officials or directors (and their relatives) – an MP, a mayor, a director of a zoo, a director of a prison and the mayor’s brother. Then, they went to the police station and paid their fine – the institutions do work. Didn’t it occur to them to express their solidarity with the ones who haven’t been able to attend a competition the whole year, with musicians who haven’t had a single concert, with the festivals and cultural events which were canceled? Has the party given them so much power that they’re now dazzled, so they themselves bragged on social media posing in front of the empty spectator seats?

What are they thinking when their leader Zaev announces to them the “spring offensive for a new turn in the political actions of SDSM and North Macedonia?” And do they take him seriously when he announces “a change in the mindset of the political parties” as the only candidate to run for president of the party?

I just don’t understand why after the brazen behavior and the impudent waste of money that we used to see with the VMRO elite, even after five years, SDSM don’t realize that because of things like that elections are lost. Do you remember? VMRO voters didn’t stress about the conversations “Mile, I have an idea,” and the millions and the percentages that were mentioned in the conversations, the slaps, the insane ones, the ditches, the chocolate and the bread. Some even believed the stories about yellow minivans until they heard the conversations about the Mercedes, the TVs for children, the seat massagers…

Whose mindset is Zaev going to change? I’m sure that those five guys who took the photo themselves are convinced that they didn’t do anything wrong when they watched handball alone in an empty sports hall. They even think that we, who ask questions and wonder at their audacity, are frustrated because we envy them and we have nothing better to do with our lives. We can’t even find cheap hotels in Mexico on booking.com.

6 Zaev also announces that the membership card doesn’t protect anyone. Regarding SDSM – we’ll wait and see. As for the DUI membership card – you bet it does protect. It grants better protection than the protection granted to James Bond by the Queen.

Can you believe it, they’ve finally dismissed the director of the Struga Hospital, Muhamed Asani, who examined patients in his illegal gynecological practice and who took out the uterus, an ovary and a kidney out of a woman giving birth with a cesarean section.

You don’t think that DUI will let this loss in resources slide, do you? Now you’ll see that his dismissal will be traded for a couple more director-position jobs. And I wouldn’t be surprised if in one of the future Government reshuffles the doctor from Struga was appointed director of the new clinical centre under construction.  Or Deputy Minister of Health. It’s not like he’s not an expert. He took out the organs expertly, but let’s not overreact – it would be too cocky even for DUI to nominate him for minister.

Translated by Nikola Gjelincheski