Budapest, December 23 (BNA) North Macedonia Prime Minister Zoran Zaev submitted his resignation to Parliament following the defeat of his Social Democratic Party in the local elections held in October.
Zaev’s move was expected, as he said in the immediate aftermath of the elections that he intended to resign as prime minister and party leader, which he did in November, German news agency DPA reported.
In the time that has passed since then, Zaev has worked to ensure an orderly transfer of power – which will take place without a change of government.
A week and a half ago, the Social Democrats elected Zaev’s favorite candidate – former Deputy Finance Minister Dimitar Kovashevsky – to succeed him as party leader.
Kovashevsky is also now in a position to become prime minister, thanks to the party’s narrow majority in parliament. The Social Democrats also have the support of a small ethnic Albanian party.
Zaev served as Prime Minister from May 2017 to January 2020 and then again since August 2020.
His distinguished achievement was the settlement of the long-running dispute with neighboring Greece over the name Macedonia.
Zaev proposed and won a 2018 referendum on changing the country’s name to North Macedonia in order to start EU accession negotiations.
The renaming took effect in 2019.
However, Bulgaria is now blocking the start of negotiations for North Macedonia’s EU membership.
MI