Hristijan Mickoski criticises opposition during 35th Independence Day speech

On 8 September, marking 35 years of the country's independence, Hristijan Mickoski used his speech to sharply criticise the opposition, accusing its members of trying to taint progress and to sow doubt even during national celebrations.

Speaking to attendees at the Independence Day event, Mickoski accused his opponents of spreading pessimism and division and of rejecting projects that he said move the country forward. He said their stance targets hospitals, roads, a new clinical centre, municipal infrastructure, high‑speed rail, and increases in salaries and pensions.

“I understand that their main task is to smear everything that brings progress, to divide, to introduce doubt into everything that is done, even into the joy and celebration for this 8th of September. There are countless questions, qualifications and descriptors that one should be disappointed by. They are a factory for producing hopelessness, despair and nihilism. Hatred that poisons society, pens that slander, insult. As if it's normal. Such a loser politics should pull us all down. Every young person to start to hesitate, to present us as all the same when we are so very different. They are against everything that goes forward. Against hospitals, against roads, against a new clinical centre, against infrastructural facilities for municipalities as we build, against high-speed rail, against higher salaries and pensions. Against data centres, against new investments. If it is said we need a new government plane, they immediately jump up and say you are indulging in luxuries. And they do not count how many lives will be saved because that plane is also for that purpose. That is short‑sighted politics. And in the end when all this finishes, neither the data centres, nor the hospitals, nor the schools in the municipalities nor the plane will I take with me, that remains with the citizens of the state, for the people. And many tell me not to back down, but I am a reasonable man, I give a chance to dialogue, because I believe that good always defeats evil, and because politics is the skill of dialogue, which is smarter and more purposeful than polarisation and blocking. I will build bridges, I will extend a hand on issues important for our future and I will not give up offering dialogue, because anybody's vanity, even mine, means nothing when it comes to Macedonia,” Mickoski said.

Trust and identity, Mickoski said, must come first

Mickoski warned that some issues cannot be the subject of compromise, linking them to national identity and historical memory. He called for confidence-building measures before meaningful talks could begin and emphasised legal and cultural points he said the opposition must accept.

“I wish and I work for us to be the generation that will bring the country into the European Union. There is no other alternative, that is true. But at the same time each of you must know that there is one last challenge that stands before us, not to finish the road but to begin it. Not because we have any guarantee that we will reach the goal, but to start to walk that path. And you will hear all those hypocritical screams of impotence from our political opponents or at least part of them, who say in a state of self-satisfaction, solve the problem. And they are not the least aware that they are the ones who essentially created the problem, who by accepting the proposal in an adventurous way created the condition for our progress towards full membership within the EU. The same ones we hear today on the open stage called to solve it. And yes, we will solve it. But patience is needed. First trust must be created, and to create trust it is necessary to stop ignoring the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg regarding the Macedonian community. It is necessary to stop denying the right to my mother tongue Macedonian. It is necessary to stop seeking the roots of the Macedonian people as a result of a decision by the Communist Comintern, but to accept a fact that is centuries old. These are facts from which there is no escape; until we accept these facts, then there is no trust. And when there is no trust there is no dialogue. Therefore first let us create trust and then conduct dialogue. Dialogue without trust leads nowhere. It only leads to new problems and new defeats,” Mickoski added.

Photo: press material from the event