North Macedonia’s governing parties have a double reason to celebrate the results of Sunday’s first round of local elections.
First, the main ruling centre-right VMRO DPMNE party of Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski expectedly crushed its main rival, the Social Democrats, SDSM, so extending its domination of politics to local level.
Second, less predictably, its junior partner, the ethnic Albanian VLEN [It’s Worth It] alliance, stood an important test against its main rival, the Democratic Union for Integration, DUI – boding well for its continued role as the second pillar on which the government of the multi-ethnic country rests.
Despite obtaining a solid result, the DUI’s hyped framing of the local election as a “referendum” on which side has the legitimacy to represent ethnic Albanians did not pan out, leaving a hint of defeat.