Skopje, 3 April 2024 (MIA) – In a televised debate between the leaders of SDSM and VMRO-DPMNE, Dimitar Kovachevski and Hristijan Mickoski, on Kanal 5 on Wednesday, Kovachevski said incumbent president Stevo Pendarovski has the capacity to win at the coming presidential elections, while Mickoski assessed that VMRO-DPMNE’s candidate will make up for all the shortcomings of Pendarovski’s five-year term.

“In SDSM we are convinced that we will earn the trust of the citizens to form the next pro-European Government of Macedonia, and Stevo Pendarovski will be once again elected as president of the country – because we have a very clear vision and plan for a European future of the country, founded on courageous decisions,” Kovachevski said.

The SDSM leader assessed that Pendarovski has demonstrated he is a president of all citizens, representing the strategic interests of the country and being one of the key players for the country’s NATO accession and the beginning of negotiations with the EU.

On the other hand, VMRO-DPMNE’s leader Hristijan Mickoski said SDSM has finally found someone who is ready to lose at the next presidential elections.

“I believe that Stevo Pendarovski, as president, demonstrated absolutely nothing with which he would earn the role of president. The citizens saw this, he is an excellent example of a person who isn’t fit to be a president of a country,” Mickoski said.

Mickoski said that, during her term, Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova would make up for “everything Macedonia lost in the past five years while Stevo Pendarovski was president”.

The VMRO-DPMNE leader said Pendarovski doesn’t have a single presidential characteristic that would convince the citizens to vote for him.