January 9 (SeeNews) - Macedonia's president Gjorge Ivanov on Monday asked Nikola Gruevski, leader of election winners VMRO-DPMNE party, to form the country's new government, state-run news agency MIA reported.
VMRO-DPMNE will have to submit its programme and form government within the next 20 days, the news agency said.
Conservative VMRO-DPMNE, which governed in coalition with ethnic Albanian Democratic Union of Integration (DUI) prior to December 11 early election, won 51 of 120 seats in Macedonia's parliament, while main opposition Social Democratic Union of Macedonia (SDSM) won 49 seats.
Having fallen short of absolute majority, VMRO-DPMNE will have to join forces with one or more of the four ethnic Albanian parties which entered parliament in the snap vote held as part of an EU-brokered agreement among Macedonia's main political parties aimed at resolving a protracted political crisis.
Following the early election, DUI has 10 seats in parliament. The other three ethnic Albanian parties which entered the new parliament control 10 seats among themselves: the Democratic Party of Albanians (DPA) has 2 seats, BESA Movement has 5 and Alliance for the Albanians has 3.
On Saturday, DUI announced that they, along with BESA and Alliance for the Albanians, have agreed to support a joint political agenda which calls for accepting the Albanian language as a second official language in the country, economic equality, as well as inclusion of ethnic Albanians in talks with Greece over Macedonia's name.
In an interview for local newspaper Dnevnik, Gruevski said on Monday that VMRO-DPMNE is willing to form government in line with currently established principles, but not at any price.