NEWS OF THE DAY: Schools, kindergartens and faculties will close for two weeks as of tomorrow
Kindergartens, primary and secondary schools and higher education institutions on the territory of the entire country will stop their work in the next 14 days, announced the Government at today’s session, as part of the additional measures for dealing with the coronavirus that were proposed by the Commission for Infectious Disease at the Ministry of Health following the meeting of the Steering Committee of the Crisis Management Center. The measures were announced by Minister of Health Venko Filipce, and also include
releasing employees from their job duties in these institutions and allowed paid leave in the next 14 days for a parent of a child not older than 10 years, employed in the public and private institutions.
Physical and legal persons who will not respect the recommendations will be punished in accordance to Article 2015 and 2016 of the Criminal Code.
– Mass outdoor and indoor gatherings of more than a thousand participants are banned on the territory of the entire country in the next 14 days, and it is also recommended not to organize cultural events at the level of the RNM, sports competitions with spectators are banned in the next 30 days. Mandatory self-isolation is being introduced for all persons coming from high and medium-risk countries for a period of 14 days. Export of medical equipment and medical supplies and materials by economic operators and manufacturers from the country is prohibited, except with special permission by the Ministry of Health. We advise the elderly and high-risk categories of citizens to reduce their movement, to avoid public transportation. Avoiding travel to high and medium-risk countries is recommended, said Filipce.
He stressed that the State Election Commission needs to release all employees of the public health institutions who are engaged in the elections from all engagements in the election process. POLITICALLY OK CORRALL: The coronavirus also enters the agenda of political parties
SDSM has postponed the activities of the President of the party, Zoran Zaev, and of the party leadership, planned for these days, and is fully respecting all recommendations of the institutions in the fight against the coronavirus, stated SDSM Secretary General, Ljupco Nikolovski.
VMRO-DPMNE Secretary General Igor Janusev considers that the government is to be blamed for the coronavirus, adding that “Instead of the Ministry of Health being the main protector against the corona, it is the greatest exporter of the virus. Nothing of the pompously announced controls, the government system is “penetrated like a sieve”. The least that can be done in this case is urgent resignation of Filipce.
Demanding a resignation of Minister Filipce is the only “recommendation” of the opposition in the fight against the coronavirus.
NOT LESS IMPORTANT
Today the Director of the Skin Disease Clinic will be dismissed, stated the Minister of Health. The Director, who tested positive for the coronavirus following a trip to Italy, due to not respecting the recommendations of the Ministry of Health and the Institute of Public Health, has endangered at least 200 people. At the same time, due to contact with her, the entire staff of the Skopje Skin Disease Clinic is in isolation, as well as the staff of the Unit for Skin Diseases of the Stip Hospital.
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Jovo Vangelovski has been dismissed. The Appeals Council within the Supreme Court of the Republic of North Macedonia rejected as unfounded the appeal of the former President – current judge Jovo Vangelovski, submitted against the decision of the Judicial Council of the Republic of North Macedonia.
As the Supreme Court announced, the appeal of Vangelovski from September 23, 2019, for his temporary removal from the post of Court Judge and President of Court was rejected at yesterday’s session.
* Alsat – M, Kanal 5, Sitel and Telma have filed a lawsuit for initiating an administrative dispute against the State Election Commission (SEC) before the Administrative Court for the decision for setting the average price achieved and the lowest price for paid political advertising for the last five election cycles. The Macedonian national televisions are dissatisfied with the price at which they will have to air the pre-election advertisements of the parties for the upcoming elections on April 12.
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In Skopje, the City of Skopje in cooperation with the National network to end violence against women and domestic violence, opened a shelter for open housing for women victims of family violence who have left their violent environment.
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Public inspection of the Voters Register for the voting of the early parliamentary elections on April 12 ends tomorrow night at midnight, and until yesterday, 7.526 citizens have checked their data in the regional offices of the SEC. The possibility for checking data of voters, deleting or adding in the Voters Register is open until the deadline.
The deadline for inspection of the Voters Register and for registering of Macedonian citizens for voting at the elections on April 12 ends also on March 11 at midnight. Until yesterday, 4.299 Macedonian citizens abroad have registered for voting in the diaspora.
CIVIL ACTIVITIES
Slobodan Bogoevski, Emel Ramkovska and Todor Piperkov PhD at CIVIL’s panel “Victims of the regime – testimonies and pictures”
The regime captured and abused the state, especially the police, judiciary and the media, and sanctioned every attempt to express a different opinion with arrests, torture, arranged court processes and lynching in the media and social networks. Detention turned into punishment, while prison sentences were maximum and draconian, based on suspicious evidence and witnesses.
Slobodan Bogoevski, Emel Ramkovska and Todor Piperkov PhD, victims of the regime, will speak at CIVIL’s panel discussion “Victims of the regime – testimonies and pictures” that is organized by CIVIL tomorrow, Wednesday, March 11, at Park Hotel (behind the City Stadium), starting at 12 noon. Xhabir Deralla, President of CIVIL, will be moderating the discussion.
Big national seminar of CIVIL for citizen journalism and monitoring
On March 21 (Saturday), at Hotel Continental, CIVIL is organizing big seminar on citizen journalism and monitoring at the national level. The seminar is dedicated to implementing transparent and responsible political processes with a special accent on monitoring the state institutions for the implementation of the early parliamentary elections in the country, as well as of all participants in the process.
This seminar is an excellent opportunity for all citizens who would like to cooperate with CIVIL in the election monitoring or in other projects of CIVIL. APPLICATION FORM
All interested citizens from across the country have the right to participate. Due to the new methodology, CIVIL will take in consideration also applications of citizens who have previously participated in one of CIVIL’s seminars, but those applying for the first time for this seminar will have an advantage. The travel costs are covered by the organization.
In a period of political turmoil, when there are increasingly more protests, hate speech, citizen journalists are the ones who can contribute towards keeping peace and strengthening the democratic processes.
CIVIL calls on all citizens, as well as all recent participants and collaborators from the seminars on citizen journalism, as well as all interested in monitoring the election processes, to photograph, record and note.
Hate speech, disinformation, fake news, black campaign and corruption are topics that are in the focus of our work. Through citizen journalism, citizens have the opportunity to be controllers of the work of the state and local officials and institutions and to pressure them to work according to the laws, transparently and responsibly.
FREE ZONE
Saso Ordanoski in his column “Excursion in Budapest”, writes that in less than 24 hours the citizens will know how the conversation between Gruevski, Mickoski and Nikolovski had went in Budapest.
“As it could be expected, the true intentions of the opposition will reflect on their candidate election lists. At every election, for all parties, that is the most delicate, pre-election cadre and political issue. Actually, SDSM, through the recently announced candidate lists, is obviously “paying off” debts for some of its difficultly made decision in the previous Parliament composition”, adds Ordanoski.
Dehran Muratov
In cooperation with: Biljana Jordanovska, Diana Tahiri, Maja Ivanovska, Saso Ordanoski