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| Turnout | 56.88% (first round) 42.63% (second round) | ||||||||||||||||
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 North Macedoniaportal |
Presidential elections were held in Macedonia in 2009. The first round was held on 22 March, alongside local elections. As no candidate received more than 50% of the vote, a run-off round was held on 5 April 2009, [1] which was won by Gjorge Ivanov of the center-right VMRO-DPMNE party. Incumbent President Branko Crvenkovski did not stand for re-election. [2]
The elections were held using the two-round system; a candidate required a majority of the vote in the first round of voting, with a second round held if no candidate crossed the threshold. There was also a requirement for voter turnout in the second round to be at least 40% to validate the result. [3] [4]
On 25 January 2009, the largest party in the Macedonian parliament, VMRO-DPMNE, appointed Gjorge Ivanov as the party's presidential candidate. [5] On 26 January 2009, the biggest opposition party in the country, the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia, proposed the former Minister of Internal Affairs and former Minister of Foreign Affairs Ljubomir Frčkoski for presidential candidate. [6] The other candidates were the independent Ljube Boškoski, New Democracy leader Imer Selmani, Nano Ružin from the Liberal Democratic Party, Agron Buxhaku of the Democratic Union for Integration and Mirushe Hoxha of the Democratic Party of Albanians, the only female candidate.
There was a poll held in January 2009, before any names of candidates for president were made official, according to which 31.2% of the Macedonian citizens would vote for the candidate to be proposed by conservative party VMRO-DPMNE while 11.4% would give their vote to the candidate of the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia. [7]
A poll from February 2009 saw Ivanov at 27%, Frčkoski at 13%, Boškoski at 10%, Selmani at 9% and other candidates together at 18%. In a run-off, Ivanov would win over Frčkoski with 36% to 21%, with a large number of undecideds, however. [8] A poll from shortly before the election saw Ivanov leading with 23.1% before Selmani with 13.3% and Frčkoski at 9.7%; 23.9% were undecided. [9]
A new poll, that was held one week prior to the run-off, saw Ivanov in lead with 25.4% and Frčkoski at 13.8% (that is, 69% to 31% of decided voters). [10] [11]
Nearly 7,000 Macedonian and 500 foreign observers monitored the vote at Macedonia's nearly 3,000 polling stations. [12] A fair and democratic election has been seen as an important factor for Macedonia's induction to NATO and the European Union.
In the first round, Ivanov strongly led in front of the other candidates with 35%, with Frčkoski getting 20% and coming in second place and advancing to the run-off. New Democracy's Imer Selmani, who had been dubbed the "Macedonian Obama" for his ability to transcend the ethnic boundaries and appeal to ethnically Macedonian voters, as well, was by far the most successful candidate, gaining 15% of the vote and coming in third place, closely behind the independent Boškoski. [13] [14] 103 voting stations could not open due to heavy snowfall; voting was to be rescheduled there. [15]
Some days before the second round of the elections took place, VMRO-DPMNE and the Democratic Union for Integration agreed on supporting each other on both, the local and presidential elections. [16]
In part due to the existence of many voters in the registers who have left Macedonia years ago and live abroad, and in part due to the lack of motivation for ethnic Albanians to participate in the second round, there were fears that the minimum turnout of 40% might not be met in the second round, invalidating the election. [17]
There was a significant number of invalid ballots in both rounds, 3.15% in the first round and even 5.87% in the runoff. According to media reports, this was due to voter apathy and disenchantment with the candidates. It is reported that there was a Facebook group "Vote for Chuck Norris" with thousands of fans. [18] It was also reported that on thousands of ballots names like "Chuck Norris", "GOD", "Jimi Hendrix" or "George Bush" were hand-written by the voters. [19] [20]
| Candidate | Party | First round | Second round | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Votes | % | Votes | % | |||
| Gjorge Ivanov | VMRO-DPMNE | 345,850 | 35.05 | 453,616 | 63.14 | |
| Ljubomir Frčkoski | Social Democratic Union of Macedonia | 202,691 | 20.54 | 264,828 | 36.86 | |
| Imer Selmani | New Democracy | 147,547 | 14.95 | |||
| Ljube Boškoski | Independent | 146,878 | 14.88 | |||
| Agron Buxhaku | Democratic Union for Integration | 73,629 | 7.46 | |||
| Nano Ružin | Liberal Democratic Party | 40,042 | 4.06 | |||
| Mirushe Hoxha | Democratic Party of Albanians | 30,225 | 3.06 | |||
| Total | 986,862 | 100.00 | 718,444 | 100.00 | ||
| Valid votes | 986,862 | 96.82 | 718,444 | 94.03 | ||
| Invalid/blank votes | 32,406 | 3.18 | 45,595 | 5.97 | ||
| Total votes | 1,019,268 | 100.00 | 764,039 | 100.00 | ||
| Registered voters/turnout | 1,792,082 | 56.88 | 1,792,082 | 42.63 | ||
| Source: SEC, SEC | ||||||
Politics in North Macedonia occur within the framework of a parliamentary representative democratic republic, whereby the Prime Minister is the head of government, and of a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in both the government and parliament. The Judiciary is independent of the executive and the legislature. The Economist Intelligence Unit rated North Macedonia a "flawed democracy" in 2022.
The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization – Democratic Party for Macedonian National Unity, often simplified as VMRO-DPMNE, is a conservative political party in North Macedonia and is the main centre-right to right-wing party in the country.
The president of the Republic of North Macedonia is the head of state of North Macedonia.
Ljube Boškoski is a Macedonian politician and former Minister of Internal Affairs of North Macedonia.
Early parliamentary elections were held in Macedonia on 1 June 2008, after the Assembly voted to dissolve itself on 12 April 2008. The result was a victory for the VMRO-DPMNE-led alliance, which won 63 of the 120 seats in the Assembly.
New Democracy is a conservative political party of ethnic Albanians in North Macedonia. It was founded in 2008 by former members of the Democratic Party of Albanians, another ethnic Albanian party from North Macedonia. The president of the party is Imer Selmani, who was one of seven candidates for the 2009 Macedonian presidential election and won 146.795 votes (14,99%) and ended up third.
Gjorge Ivanov is a Macedonian politician, who served as the 4th President of North Macedonia from 2009 to 2019.
United for Macedonia is a political party in North Macedonia. It was founded by Ljube Boškoski, a former interior minister and former member of the conservative VMRO-DPMNE.
Todor Petrov is the president of the Macedonian diaspora organisation World Macedonian Congress (WMC). Petrov is a councillor in the electorate of Gazi Baba.
The Liberal Democratic Party is a social-liberal political party in North Macedonia. The Liberal Democratic Party was launched in April 1997 as a merger between the Liberal Party and the Democratic Party. The first leader of the party was Petar Goshev from the Democrats, who was also the last president of the League of Communists of Macedonia. When the Liberal Party was re-established in 1999, a significant portion of the former Liberal Party remained in LDP.
Early parliamentary elections were held in the Republic of Macedonia on 5 June 2011, a year earlier than necessary. All 123 parliamentary seats of the Sobranie were due for election, including the 3 seats provided for the first time for representatives of the Macedonian citizens living abroad: 1 from Europe, 1 from North America, and 1 from Asia and Australia. The decision of the ruling parties, the Christian Democratic VMRO-DPMNE and the ethnic Albanian Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), to dissolve the Parliament and call for an early election was preceded by protests of the Social Democratic Union (SDSM), the major opposition party, and subsequent boycott of the Parliament by them, and by other smaller opposition parties.
The sixth local elections for the election of local mayors of the municipalities of the Republic of Macedonia and members of municipality councils were held on schedule in 2013. There were two large coalitions on the elections: the Coalition for a Better Macedonia led by VMRO-DPMNE and the Union for the Future led by SDSM. Also present on the elections was the Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), Democratic Party of Albanians (DPA) and the Union of Roma Forces. There was also coalition made between the two major rival parties VMRO-DPMNE and SDSM in Kičevo and Struga municipalities against the ethnic Albanian candidates Fatmir Dehari and Ramiz Merko of DUI. There were two rounds in the elections on March 24, 2013 and April 7, 2013. The first round of elections were declared the most peaceful elections in the history of independent Macedonia without any serious incidents. The elections were however not untainted, as the situation in the Centar Municipality was labeled as undemocratic by the Macedonian opposition with several voters being labeled as questionable for having only recently received their national ID cards and not being actual inhabitants of this respective municipality. The elections in this municipality lasted for three turns and were monitored by the foreign embassies.
General elections[a] were held in the Republic of Macedonia in April 2014 to elect the President and members of parliament. The first round of the presidential elections were held on 13 April, with incumbent president Gjorge Ivanov finishing first with 53% of the vote. However, as he did not receive the support of 50% of all registered voters, a second round was held on 27 April, alongside parliamentary elections, with Ivanov and the ruling coalition led by VMRO-DPMNE claiming victory as Ivanov was elected president and the VMRO-DPMNE won 61 of the 123 seats in the Assembly.
The following lists events that happened during 2014 in the Republic of Macedonia.
Early parliamentary elections were held in Macedonia on 11 December 2016, having originally been planned for 24 April and later 5 June.
In April 2016, protests began in the Republic of Macedonia against the incumbent President Gjorge Ivanov and the government led by the interim Prime Minister Emil Dimitriev from the ruling VMRO-DPMNE party. Referred to by some as the Colorful Revolution, the protests started after the controversial decision by President Gjorge Ivanov to stop the investigation of former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski and dozens of politicians who were allegedly involved in a wiretapping scandal. The demonstrations were organized by "Protestiram" and supported by a coalition led by the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia and other opposition parties, in addition to the newly formed Levica demanding that the government resign and be replaced by a transitional government and that the parliamentary elections planned for 5 June 2016 be cancelled, on the grounds that the conditions for free and transparent elections were not in place. The government and its supporters, who had organized pro-government rallies, maintained that the elections on June 5 were the only solution to the political crisis, with some observers blaming the opposition for creating a "Ukraine scenario" in Macedonia.
Presidential elections were held in North Macedonia in 2019. Three candidates were on the ballot in the first round, held on 21 April: Stevo Pendarovski, supported by the ruling coalition led by the Social Democratic Union of Macedonia, including the Democratic Union for Integration; Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova of the leading opposition party VMRO-DPMNE, and Blerim Reka, an independent supported by Albanian opposition parties Alliance for Albanians and Besa Movement. The first round did not result in an absolute majority for any candidate, with Pendarovski receiving the most votes. In the second round held on 5 May, Pendarovski defeated Siljanovska-Davkova with 54% of the vote.
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Parliamentary elections were held in North Macedonia on 8 May 2024. The slow pace of EU integration and corruption were the main issues during the campaign.
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