Political situation

The transition
The first multiparty elections in the history of Macedonia were held in December 1990: on this occasion the VMRO-DPMN, a largely working-class nationalist movement, won 38 of the 120 seats in the �Sobranie�, the Macedonian Parliament, but was unable to form a government. The transition towards independence was, therefore, led by a �government of experts� - whose members were mostly recruited from outside the parties � which collapsed on July 1992 . One month impasse was required to constitute a new coalition gathering the moderate forces in the country. While Kiro Gligorov, a politician traditionally close to Tito and promoter of the transition, chaired the maximum charge of the State, Branko Crevnovski was appointed to guide the Government.

The new cabinet included representatives from the Social Democratic Party of Macedonia (SDAM), the Liberal Party (LP), the Socialist Party (SP) and, notably, the Albanian PDP (Party of Democratic Prosperity). The October 1994 elections substantially reconfirmed the coalition in power by granting it an overwhelming majority of seven-eighths in the Sobranie.
Much of the political effort carried out by the Macedonian Government in this phase was directed to the achievement of formal recognition by the international community. The process was partially slowed down by the reluctance of the Greek authorities which formally protested against the denomination of the State and the use of national symbols (such as the Star of Vergina as a flag). The Greek authorities carried out an anti-Macedonian lobbying in the international fora and tried to prevent the denomination of the country as Macedonia.

In April 1993 Macedonia was accepted as a member of the United Nations under the provisional name of �Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia� (FYROM) and subsequently in 1995, entered both OSCE and Council of Europe. In the same year Greece and Macedonia reached an agreement leading to mutual recognition and establishment of diplomatic relations.
The political coalition in power was committed in a controlled privatisation process leading to the progressive acceptance of a liberal economic logic. The concomitant fight against corruption exposed the political elite to the threats of illegally trafficking groups.

The 1998 parliamentary elections brought a marked change in the political panorama of the country. The coalition constituted by the VMRO-DPMN and the new multiethnic party Democratic Alternative (DA) gained a slight majority that was reinforced by a strategic coalition with the two Albanian parties (PDP and DPA) which jointly achieved the historical result of 27 seats - the highest representation of the minority in the Sobranie. After a refusal to purge its leadership of the most �socialist oriented� members, PDP left the Government and moved to the opposition.

Recent developments
Macedonia was the only former-Yugoslav State that had not experienced war on its ground: the independence was achieved, in fact, without a single bullet being shot. The internal situation rarely reached critical peaks thanks to a rather inclusive approach adopted by the political elites toward the minority issue. The rising of irredentist movements was, instead, prompted by the activities carried out by nationalist groups in the kin-States of the various minorities present in the country.

The northern �Albanian corridor� - largely bordering Kosovo and Albania - progressively became theatre of clashes between Albanian pro-independence groups and Macedonian armed forces that finally escalated into conflict throughout 2001 and concluded with signing by the warring parties of the Ohrid Peace Accord on August 13 of the same year.

Recent electoral events marked a new reversal in Macedonian political trends. The 15 September 2002 parliamentary elections, the first ones since the peace-agreement, held in a climate of high tension (for the fear of incidents between supporters of different ethnic-oriented parties) saw the victory of the social-democratic coalition �Together for Macedonia�. The group having gained half of the seats available in the Sobranie overthrew the VMRO-DPMN government led by yesterday�s Premier Ljubco Georgievski and started preparing to lead the country for the next four years. Branko Crvenkovski, newly appointed Prime Minister, takes up the difficult task of creating among the public widespread confidence in the peace-building process.

On February 26, 2004, while flying to Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina, to participate in a regional conference on investments, President Boris Trajkovski died when the Government�s plane crashed in the mountains of Herzegovina, just minutes from the landing strip of the Mostar International Airport. The early Presidential Elections held in April 2004 were won by then Prime Minister Crvenkovski, and after much infighting in the SDSM, Vlado Buckovski was appointed new Prime Minister.

Macedonia saw another political crisis in the summer of 2004, when the new proposal for the territorial map of municipalities was submitted to the Parliament for adoption. The nationalist parties of the Macedonian didn�t agree with the new proposal that created several municipalities that could provide for the greater application of minority language rights, but also a loss of majority on local level for the Macedonian population in favour of Albanians in western Macedonia. Series of protests were organized, some of them violent, and the crises resulted in a referendum initiative, which could have annulled the Law and take it back for review and rewriting. The referendum failed as less than the required 50% of total registered voters decided to take part in the plebiscite.

Local Elections are scheduled for March 13, 2005, for mayors and city council members in 85 municipalities. These are the first local elections after the adoption of the new legislation on local self-government in 2002, which gives much greater competence to the local authorities in disposal with public funds and local level decisions.

In 2004, Macedonia accelerated its efforts towards integration in the EU. It has already reeved and submitted the EU questionnaire in December 2004. The Government is hoping to get the Candidate status by the end of 2005.