1 Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski warns that the people will self-organise and the situation will escalate if the five members of the Judicial Council, who were subject to an interpellation vote in Parliament, don’t resign. And, being eager for justice, he will lead the protest.

All those who think that it’s not very logical for the executive branch to protest on the streets against the judicial branch, and especially for the prime minister to lead such protests, should remember that just five years ago, in February 2020, a few days before the Covid lockdowns, then-Prime Minister Zoran Zaev led a protest outside the Criminal Court during the SDSM march titled “We walk for justice.” At the time, VMRO-DPMNE issued a statement that SDSM was the first party ever to protest against itself.

Five years later, VMRO-DPMNE has become the second party to protest against itself.

During the government protest in 2020, Zaev said that, like the citizens, he wasn’t satisfied with the legal system, and told prosecutors, judges, and jurors “not to feel pressured” and that “neither VMRO nor Mickoski can do anything to them.”

Five years later, Mickoski says: “They’ll witness the power of the people, people will take to the streets and protest, people are hungry and thirsty for justice.”

Perhaps they all attended the same political schools for good governance.

History in Macedonia repeats itself like a farce. It’s hard to search for logic in a country where nothing is logical.

2 No one can dispute the fact that the judiciary sucks and that people are “eager for justice.” All reports from the EU and the US State Department have highlighted the partisan nature of our judiciary. Would millions and millions of foreign aid for training judges and prosecutors have been poured here if the judiciary were actually ok? In fact, we’ve all heard the wiretapped conversations and how Mickoski’s party appointed judges, with the secretary of Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski dictating the names to the president of the Judicial Council. Those judges ensured that the statue of limitations on cases involving VMRO officials expired. And Zaev promised: I’ll open the judiciary like a bud. His SDSM blossomed it to such an extent that it even changed the law, granting pardons, and allowing the statute of limitations on cases involving high-ranking officials to expire.

Zaev came to power in 2017 on the back of the slogan “No justice, no peace.” Mickoski now says: We won half a million votes, and an important part of that campaign was justice for everyone, not for individuals.

True, very true. At least now Mickoski, unlike Zaev, has a comfortable majority in Parliament and can easily change the laws on the judiciary, ensuring that the people are happy and no longer need to take to the streets over five out of 13 members of the Judicial Council, whose names they don’t even know. He’d provide both justice and peace.

What people will protest? Your people? And what will they protest for? Against judges who aren’t yours?

They certainly aren’t ours.

3 The Macedonian public was soon confronted with yet another painful lesson in how impunity kills. I don’t know anyone who isn’t horrified by the details of the testimony regarding the kidnapping and murder of 14-year-old Vanja Gjorchevska, for which Ljupcho Palevski – Palcho is on trial.

If the state had brought the hammer down on Palcho back in the 1990s when he built his first illegal building in Skopje’s Debar Maalo, surely the teenager Vanja from Skopje and the collateral victim Panche from Veles would still be alive today. Until the 1990s, the concept of an illegal building in the city centre was unheard of. Now, it’s a practice that surprises no one. The inspections tore down three or four walls of the illegal building, and then he collected millions in damages from the state. Palcho was so important that state institutions stepped in to save him from bankruptcy, moving into his business premises in buildings for which he had neither property certificates nor usage permits. At the time, we found that shocking, but now it’s commonplace.

And just like that, the empowered Palcho, untouchable by anyone, became a very influential figure in society – president of the city organisation of SDSM, businessman, owner of newspapers and television stations, construction investor… He slapped up an eyesore of a building at the end of Partizanska Street, where an underground passage was to be dug to connect to the Railway Station. All because no one could say “no,” it had to be “yes.” After a while, that too became normal. He then formed his own party, paraded in front of cameras because he had something very important to say, and proceeded to blackmail with wiretapped conversations and used recorded CDs to strike deals. He was taken in for a short interrogation and quickly released. Had he ended up in prison, Vanja would surely still be alive.

Now, we’re horrified by the testimonies about the ease with which he fired a bullet into the head of a terrified 14-year-old girl and the holes he dug to put the kidnapped victims, their feet tied with weights. The big fish Palcho, who was empowered by politicians, businessmen, inspectors, police officers, investigators, judges, prosecutors, journalists, who tolerated his crimes and saved him from prison…

They are all accomplices to Palcho’s monstrous crimes. The burden of Vanja’s death is theirs to bear for the rest of their lives.”

Translated by Nikola Gjelincheski