North Macedonia Government (AP Photo/Boris Grdanoski)
North Macedonia’s MPs with a majority vote elected late in the evening on Aug. 30 a new coalition government bringing together the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia and the Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), with Zoran Zaev as the new prime minister.
After a two-day debate, all 62 MPs of the parliamentary majority voted for the new government, with one of them voting from a special booth set up according to the COVID-19 protocols in the parliament building. The 51 opposition MPs from the VMRO-DPMNE and the coalition of the Alliance for Albanians and the Alternative voted against. The Macedonian parliament has 120 seats.
The new prime minister and the cabinet ministers immediately took a solem oath before Parliament Speaker Talat Xhaferi and MPs of the ruling majority while the opposition left the hall.
Prime Minister Zaev said in his address that his government will be dedicated to strengthening the economy and fighting, with resolve and uncompromisingly, crime and corruption, stressing that the country ought to have an efficient, European legal system.
The new cabinet has 19 ministers, seven less than the previous one, also led by Zaev. For the first time the government has the post of first deputy prime minister, now held by the DUI, and an Albanian as a foreign minister.
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