1 The senior-year student Toni Sali passed away at 19. He spent 10 years fighting the state to get his unique master citizen number. And since Toni didn’t have a unique master citizen number, he couldn’t have a GP. Nor could he have social assistance. Nor a bank account. His family was poor, so he couldn’t afford private healthcare. And just like that – Toni died. It’s like he never even existed. All that remains are the straight As in his report cards, simply because someone in this country figured out that based on the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Toni could enrol in school even if he didn’t have a unique master citizen number.

Everything is done according to the law in this country, where unique master citizen numbers are issued to non-existent citizens, where multiple ID cards with different addresses are issued to the same people for vote rigging, where valid forged passports are issued to criminals from all over the world, and yet – when it comes to Toni, the straight-A student from Shuto Orizari, nobody in the country could find a solution.

This is what I wrote about Toni back in May 2021. Even before that, for at least two years, our editorial team had been writing about the problems faced by people without personal identification numbers. Finally, in 2023, a law was passed to registers the unregistered. However, it’s painfully obvious how poorly that law is aligned with other state institutions. And the protests of citizens in Roma communities sparked by police confiscating their cars because they were unregistered and driven without licences, have once again brought to the surface the issue of how this vulnerable group is left to fend for itself. And how easily racism is stirred.

It’s completely pointless to argue whether someone should be allowed to drive without a driving licence, let alone an unregistered car. That is not up for debate. Just as it shouldn’t be up for debate whether there are more traffic cameras on roads used predominantly by Macedonians, Albanians, or foreigners. For once, the authorities decided to do something about overall traffic safety, and suddenly people are debating whether the human rights of those breaking the laws have been violated.

But in this case, non-existent people are driving non-existent cars – and no one even raises that issue. What should be up for debate, however, is the fact that a group of our fellow citizens experienced the implementation of the “Safe City” traffic fines law as a punishment for poverty.

It’s astonishing how much European and domestic money has been spent on various projects for the emancipation of Roma communities, several parties with the identical ideological symbols and ideas have been formed, we celebrated the Decade of Roma Inclusion, there are ministries without portfolios, countless NGOs… But let’s not forget, NGOs work through projects. You can’t expect champagne on a beer budget. No matter how much they contribute, it’s all in vain if a project doesn’t become state practice. The money spent on seminars and training is in vain if these citizens remain outside the system.

One of the protesters said: “Our country needs us only when there are elections.”

If elections were being held now, parties might well be handing driving licences in exchange for votes. They might even register their cars too.

And those who were issued criminal charges for threatening the state leadership during the protests will not simply apologise and move on. It wasn’t so long ago that we heard, in the wiretapped conversations: “We’ll drag the gypsies by the ears.”

2 In an interview with the public broadcaster MRT, Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski commented on the seizure of five tonnes of drugs in Serbia that had entered through the Macedonian border and said the case was the result of policies pursued by the previous government led by SDSM and DUI, which misled a large number of citizens and investors into believing they would become millionaires by opening medical cannabis businesses.

“I expect the Ministry of Internal Affairs to come forward with tens of tonnes, not a few tonnes, but tens of tonnes of this type of illicit goods, that is, illicit substances, drugs, marijuana in this case, which are currently stored in warehouses in Macedonia,” Mickoski said on television.

First, did the prime minister compromise a police action by publicly announcing it?

Second, how did the prime minister know how much marijuana the police would find in an operation that has yet to take place?

And third, if the police already knew how many drugs were stored in warehouses across the country, why did they wait for until now to act? Were they waiting for the Serbian police to seize five tonnes first? Or were the citizens misled by SDSM and DUI into believing they would become millionaires by producing marijuana, with nowhere to sell it now, forcing them to smuggle it across the border that is now controlled by VMRO-DPMNE and VREDI?

3 The mayor of Skopje, Orce Gjorgievski, said that in a short period of time he had managed to stabilise the capital’s finances and announced that “We are embarking on the biggest investment offensive ever.”

Orce Gjorgjievski can’t remember the investment drive in Skopje after the end of the World War II, when the infrastructure of the capital of the newly formed Macedonian state was being built.

He can’t remember the massive reconstruction effort with investments from across Yugoslavia and from around the world after the catastrophic earthquake in 1963.

But he surely can’t have forgotten Skopje 2014. That was quite an offensive, one that cost us 700 million euros. Was that a modest investment boom? We’re still repaying the loans, we’re still living with the consequences.

I understand how propaganda works, but not everything qualifies as historic. A few days ago, Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski said that the decision of the Council of Europe to close the post-monitoring dialogue with Macedonia after 26 years marked “a historic day, I would say, side by side with the day when independence was declared.”  How the abolition of post-monitoring can be considered equally historic as declaring state independence is something only the Prime Minister seems to know. As for the idea that 99 percent of citizens even understand what a “post-monitoring dialogue” even means – I wouldn’t bet on it!

These contemporary VMRO officials should tone down their enthusiasm for the notion that history beings with them. It’s not as though we were born yesterday.

4 In an interview with 360 Degrees, Minister of Finance Gordana Dimitrieska-Kochoska, speaking about the linear increase in pensions, offered a simple explanation: “We divided the pile equally among everyone.”

When a finance minister explains the country’s fiscal policy in such simple terms based on “we promised this during the election campaign, and this is what citizens voted for”, I wonder why people even bother with public debates, why they protest, pretend to engage constructively in social dialogue and when the topic of salary increases is discussed, especially when it comes to salaries in the state and public administration, including officials, from the President of the country and the Prime Minister all the way down to mayors. Why do the authorities casually throw percentages around, first 10 per cent, then 8 per cent, this year this much, next year it will increase to… instead of simply giving everyone a linear increase of, let’s say, 1,500 denars each? From ministers to the youngest filing clerk. That’s the budget. There’s only one pile. Forget the percentages. Divide the pile to everyone equally.

Prime Minister Mickoski said in an interview with the public broadcaster that he would introduce a “constitutional and legal reduction of the coefficients for officials’ salaries by the end of this Government’s mandate, in 2028”.

Apparently, officials’ salaries are going to be reduced by the end of the government’s mandate. Why not reduce them now? By the end of the mandate, will they somehow hold a larger majority in the Assembly than they do now?

As for SDSM, it has become just a decorative figure in the political landscape, posing as an opposition so that we can claim to have some form of democracy. That’s why the Minister of Finance and the Prime Minister feel free to brazenly tell tall tales.

Translated by Nikola Gjelincheski