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Live Blog: North Macedonia Elections 2020

July 15, 202012:01

July 15, 202012:01

Stay tuned for the latest updates as North Macedonia holds its early general election amid the coronavirus outbreak – with no clear winner in sight, as none of the contenders looks set to win a majority of votes.

Some 1.8 million voters will have an opportunity to cast votes in North Macedonia’s early general elections on Wednesday, whose results are hard to call. The general election is the tenth since the country became independent in the early 1990s.
For the purpose of elections, North Macedonia is divided into six electoral districts, each electing 20 MPs to the 120-seat parliament.
The two main blocs centred around the ruling Social Democrats, SDSM, and the opposition right-wing VMRO DPMNE party, are running almost neck and neck in the opinion polls. As a result, the outcome of the election is unclear. Neither bloc looks set to win an outright majority.
A battle for supremacy will also be waged in the ethnic Albanian political camp between the junior ruling party, the Democratic Union for Integration, DUI, and an opposition alliance comprising the Alliance for Albanians and Alternative parties.
The DUI will also have to fend off a challenge from the Social Democrat-led alliance, which is also competing for ethnic Albanian votes with the help of its coalition ally, the Albanian BESA movement.
Ethnic Albanian parties are expected to play the role of kingmakers during talks after the election on the formation of a new government.
In mid-March, North Macedonia introduced a strict lockdown that temporarily curbed the coronavirus outbreak. However, since preventative measures were eased, the number of new infections has soared and is currently at an all-time high.
The polls are taking place amid strict health safety rules and voting will last two hours longer than usual, until 9pm, to avoid congestion at polling stations. People with COVID-19 and those in isolation had an opportunity to vote on Monday.
The elections will determine who leads the country for the next four years. While the first task will be dealing with the unsolved health crisis, the next mandate will also be dominated by the start of EU accession talks.