FLASH
Shkruar nga Prof. dr. Skënder ASANI
Instead of building a governance model on civic trust and institutional equality, political elites have allowed narrow party calculations to obscure the state vision.
Europe does not accept states that divide citizens according to their affiliation, but those that build common values on justice and inclusion. NATO does not only provide military security, but also requires internal political stability and social partnership. The Macedonian state elite must abandon the dangerous nostalgia of ethnocentric projects and embrace the philosophy of coexistence as a model for the future.
When a state reaches the point of political maturity, it must know how to choose between memory and responsibility, between fear and vision. The “crossroads of political maturity” is not an abstract metaphor, but the reality that North Macedonia faces today. This is the moment that will determine whether the country will move forward towards a Euro-Atlantic future, or remain hostage to the ethnocentric projects that have kept it in a cycle of repeated crises and divisions for three decades.
Political maturity, in this context, means the ability to abandon the rhetoric of fear, to choose coexistence over domination, and to make interethnic cohesion the foundation of modern statehood.
The political history of North Macedonia is not measured by the number of institutions it has built, but by its ability to learn from the mistakes of the past. For almost three decades, the country has gone through repeated cycles of political and interethnic crises, which have not been a product of the nature of society, but of old nationalist projects restored in a modern form. Every time the country approaches a new stage of integration, old impulses of exclusion and ethnic domination awaken, which try to hold the state hostage to the past.
Last year's election campaign demonstrated how populist rhetoric can become a dangerous mechanism for the deformation of statehood itself. With the thesis of "restoring the state," Prime Minister Mickovski managed to win the parliamentary elections, building a narrative that aimed not at reforming, but rather at suppressing the laws that constitute the basis of Albanian statehood.
After taking power, his government paved the way for shady financial deals with billions of loans of unclear origin and created free ground for the expansion of the Serbian world and Russian-Chinese influence, putting the country on a trajectory without direction and without security. Even at the start of the campaign for local elections, his political rhetoric continues to maintain the same exclusionary tone, warning of the elimination of the Albanian political entity that was born from the spirit of the Ohrid Agreement, a force that for two decades has been the promoter of its implementation. After these elections, the responsibility for the future orientation of Macedonia falls on the prime minister himself: whether the country will choose the path of stability and Euro-Atlantic integration, or will it drag itself into a spiral of conflicts that could plunge it into instability and without prospects.
Instead of building a governance model based on civic trust and institutional equality, political elites have allowed narrow party calculations to cloud the state vision. Thus, even the most important processes such as constitutional changes and identity debates have been instrumentalized for short-term political gains, diluting the spirit of interethnic partnership that made stability possible after 2001.
The historical memory of 2001 should not be seen as a trauma, but as a compass for the future. The Ohrid Agreement was not just a peace pact, but the foundation for a new democratic order, which elevated civic equality to a constitutional principle and made coexistence part of the state identity.
Any attempt to relativize this agreement, to replace it with models of ethnic selectivity or to use it as a tool of political pressure, is a deviation from the path of stability and integration. The history of this country has proven that whenever the spirit of Ohrid has been challenged, the country has plunged into crisis; and whenever it has been respected, North Macedonia has moved forward on the Euro-Atlantic path.
In this political reality, the Albanian factor has played and continues to play the most stabilizing role in the state. Albanians have demonstrated unwavering commitment to Western European values and have been promoters of civic equality, maintaining stability even in the most sensitive moments.
But this responsibility cannot remain one-sided. A state cannot be built on the unilateral sacrifice of one community, but on the joint commitment of all citizens. The Macedonian state elite must understand that respecting the Albanian factor is not a matter of favor, but a guarantee for the very existence of the multiethnic state.
Interethnic cohesion is not a political luxury, nor is temporary compromise a state strategy for survival and development. In a region where ethnic tensions and external interference are still destabilizing factors, only building a society with real equality and mutual trust can guarantee long-term stability.
Europe does not accept states that divide citizens according to their affiliation, but those that build common values on justice and inclusion. NATO does not only provide military security, but also seeks internal political stability and social partnership.
North Macedonia must understand this reality: without internal interethnic consensus, any integration process remains formal and fragile.
This is the moment when North Macedonia must show political and historical prudence. The time for alibis is over. If this country wants to maintain stability and open up the prospect of integration, it must free itself from the shackles of the past and build a new social contract on interethnic partnership, institutional respect, and civic justice.
The Macedonian state elite must abandon the dangerous nostalgia of ethnocentric projects and embrace the philosophy of coexistence as a model for the future. Because only a North Macedonia that builds its future on respect, equality, and a unifying vision will be able to move confidently towards Euro-Atlantic integration and gain the respect of international partners.
This is the crossroads of political prudence: to choose the path of coexistence as a guarantee for peace, development and perspective, otherwise, history will not forgive the repetition of mistakes, but will prove that the lack of political prudence can turn into a historical own goal, where not only stability is lost, but also the very idea of the multiethnic state that was built with many sacrifices. And at that moment, it will be too late to return to the path of political reason that time and history require.
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