March 2 (SeeNews) - All Macedonian leaders, including the president, must respect the outcome of the recent elections, EU enlargement commissioner Johannes Hahn has said after president Gjorge Ivanov declined to task main opposition party leader with forming a government.
Despite the proof of parliamentary majority which the leader of the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDSM) Zoran Zaev had presented, Ivanov on Wednesday refused to award him the mandate for forming Macedonia's next government over concerns that SDSM's agreement with ethnic Albanian parties threatens the country's sovereignty.
"The process of post-election coalescing and the formation of a new government has become hostage to a post-election platform devised by a foreign country," president Gjorge Ivanov said, adding that this platform threatens Macedonia's sovereignty and independence.
The platform, to which Ivanov refers, is a declaration by three of the country's four ethnic Albanian parties on the terms under which they would take part in a coalition government. One of these conditions concerns the official use of the Albanian language alongside the Macedonian one. The document was drafted and signed by the three ethnic Albanian parties after consultations with Albania's prime minister Edi Rama and foreign minister Ditmir Bushati.
"In a democracy, one must acknowledge parliamentary majorities, even if one doesn't like them," Hahn said a statement published on the website of the European Commission late on Wednesday.
Hahn called upon all political leaders and institutions in Macedonia "to let the democratic process run its course - in the interest of the country's citizens."
Earlier this week Zaev, whose party came in second in the December early election, secured a parliamentary majority to form a government after reaching an agreement with the ethnic Albanian parties on key issues regarding the governance of Macedonia, including the use of the Albanian language. The deal came after the election winners, conservative VMRO-DPMNE party, failed to agree with ethnic Albanian party DUI on forging a government coalition.