North Macedonia’s Prime Minister Zoran Zaev announced late on Sunday, October 31 that he will be stepping down from his post in the office along with resigning as leader of the ruling Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDSM) after his centre-left party suffered defeat in local elections.
The announcement comes after the conservative opposition party VMRO-DPMNE appeared to emerge victorious in most of the country’s municipal polls in the second round of voting on Sunday. Preliminary polling data predicted the victory of centre-right independent candidate Danela Arsovska, supported by both VMRO-DPMNE and the Albanian opposition, in the elections held for the post of Mayor in the country’s capital Skopje.
Danela was expected to win by leading the incumbent SDSM candidate in Skopje with 55.3 per cent support. The Social Democratic Union of Macedonia, on the other hand, was expected to win fewer than 20 seats following which Zaev conceded defeat in the capital.
“I take responsibility for these developments. I resign from the post of Prime Minister and Party President,” Zoran Zaev asserted at a press conference. He also congratulated his political rival Hristijan Mickoski, leader of VMRO-DPMNE, for the successful performance of his party in the elections but alluded that the opposition had employed foreign funds for their election campaigns.
Zaev, however, affirmed that he will assume a caretaker role in the office to oversee the process of appointment of a new Prime Minister by the coalition government to the office. North Macedonian law states that the coalition government could agree on another candidate for the post of Prime Minister and form a government without a new vote.
