Parliament on Wednesday is holding a session to discuss the motion of no confidence against Deputy PM for European Affairs Nikola Dimitrov filed by the opposition where the ruling majority and opposition MPs are at loggerheads over his performance.
Opposition MPs said they filed the no-confidence motion because the public was manipulated over the country being approved a date to start negotiations with the EU, and the series of foreign policy failures among other things.
“Dimitrov is the architect of the Friendship Treaty with Bulgaria, which is flawed. It contains no protection clauses in case Bulgaria violates its part of the agreement,” VMRO-DPMNE Aleksandar Nikolovski said.
He accused Deputy PM Dimitrov and PM Zaev of being responsible for Macedonia not having opened negotiations to join the EU despite the current government making it a top priority. “Not knowing when or if it will negotiate is the biggest fiasco this government could have experienced,” Nikolovski said.
Addressing the MPs, Dimitrov said that the Friendship Treaty with Bulgaria had been unanimously welcomed by the international community, calling it a great inspiration for the whole region and a big step for the country toward the EU.
“The government got an unconditional recommendation for EU accession negotiations and our neighbor, Bulgaria, was the one that violated Article 2 of the Treaty, where it obligated to help us on our path to EU integration,” he said.
Dimitrov noted that it was his job to negotiate the agreements to be in the best possible interest of the country. “It’s not my responsibility if a country decides against honoring an agreement,” he said.
Addressing opposition criticism, Dimitrov said if the opposition truly wanted to tackle ‘the unfortunate developments arising from the neighbor’s non-European behavior’, it should have risen above party lines and join the government in its EU integration efforts in a bid to meet the second strategic goal after the country had joined NATO last year.
He rejected accusations that he had betrayed the Macedonian national interests. “Bulgaria says I’m not backing down. You want me to be held accountable for the intergovernmental conference with the EU even though I’d clearly said it shouldn’t be held if Macedonian language is the condition. I know it’s very hard even for you to understand what you are trying to achieve,” Deputy Dimitrov stated.
The ruling majority, led by SDSM, called the motion of no confidence ‘baseless’, accusing VMRO-DPMNE of trying to devalue the government’s foreign policy achievements.
According to the Parliament’s Rules of Procedures, MPs have one day until midnight to discuss a no-confidence motion.
This is the third no-confidence motion filed against Dimitrov in the past 3,5 years. Dimitrov survived two no-confidence votes as foreign minister.
