The political crisis in Macedonia that ensued after President Gjorgje Ivanov refused to give a mandate to opposition leader Zoran Zaev to form a new government is showing no signs of abatement. While former Prime Minister and VMRO-DPMNE leader Nikola Gruevski sent out letters to foreign heads of state for support, and claimed that only new elections will bring a solution, the former opposition parties making up the new majority in parliament agreed to ignore the President and convene the new parliament.
This new parliament would be able to choose a new speaker, and perhaps also a new Prime Minister, Zoran Zaev. In an interview to Plus Info, BDI spokesperson Bujar Osmani stated:
This issue has been discussed within the new parliamentary majority and we have agreed that matters should follow in this order: to constitute the parliament, elect a speaker and meanwhile wait and see whether Ivanov reflects on his decision and changes his mind by awarding [the former opposition] the mandate.
He added:
If there are no changes in his decision, we will go with plan B, the election of the new government without an awarded mandate from the President.
In an interview with Reuters, Ahmeti stated that part of his agreement with Zaev was that the new parliament would choose an ethnic Albanian as speaker of the house, presumably Ahmeti himself. He added that he would execute his new function in Albanian:
In the Parliament of the Republic of Macedonia, if I will be Speaker, I will speak Albanian. I need to lead the parliamentary session in the Albanian language. In spoken and written form, the Albanian language has to be used by all state institutions. That means the official usage of the Albanian language. At this point the Albanian language is used only at a local level.
