I’ve been informed that a topic for discussion between the political parties is the fresh attempt made to additionally edit the electoral roll, which has been made available for the public and sent to the political parties to review it. Despite all of these efforts, this topic keeps on being opened. I hope this attempt at ultimately closing the issue, with all political parties acknowledging the electoral roll has been cleaned up, will be the final stage and the issue will be closed.

This was stated by Prime Minister Emil Dimitriev at a Q&A session in Parliament on Thursday after being asked about the voter’s list and the process of cleaning it up as regards future steps set to be taken to organize a census in Macedonia and asked why it had been cancelled in 2011.

“At the moment, the political parties are aligning their positions agreeing that a check-up of nearly 40,000 citizens should be conducted after not being found during field checks and of close to 170,000 citizens assumed to be temporarily working abroad… These are the parameters being discussed by the political parties and depending on the agreement they are going to reach, the State Election Commission (SEC) will start cleaning the electoral roll. The government will keep on fully supporting the SEC ensuring it is fulfilling its agenda,” elaborated PM Dimitriev adding the cleaning of the voter’s list was one of the top issues discussed by the political parties in their negotiations aimed at resolving the crisis in Macedonia.

The voter’s list, he added, has long been the subject of major polemics, while the truth is an entirely different thing. “The cleaning of the voter’s list is in fact a legal obligation of the SEC, which has to be done continuously, not only prior to the upcoming elections. The voter’s list is a living document. The parties have determined a methodology on editing the voter’s list, approved and signed by the four parties that are involved in the inter-party talks. The methodology to clean the voter’s list was respected and the SEC had approved the voter’s list prior to June 5 – the second election date which has been since cancelled. However, the opposition opened several dilemmas questioning whether the voter’s list had been edited as it should,” noted the PM.

Also, Dimitriev thanked all international institutions that had helped implement the process to clean the voter’s list by putting their resources at disposal.

Furthermore, a political consensus between the political parties is required to organize a census in Macedonia, according to him.

“For a start, it’s good to have a general consensus amongst the political parties involving the way in which the census should be conducted,” the Macedonian Premier said stating that the country should aim at establishing a civil society as a model making Macedonia functional and sustainable in the long run.

He urged the operation (of holding a census) to be separated from the political crisis. “Amid extreme polarization of political relations, the launching of such operation for me it’s quite uncertain,” Dimitriev said noting that state institutions were prepared to kick off the ‘major’ statistical operation ‘even now’.

“The census is part of a set of issues requiring a political consensus in order this major operation to be credible and its results to be recognized. If they are to be denied, it will be quite unproductive for us, as a country,” PM Dimitriev stressed.