Skopje, 12 October 2025 (MIA) — The Macedonian diaspora community must be an equal partner in helping the country to become a standard European state young people will stay in and emigrants will be in touch with and come back to, President Gordana Siljanovska Davkova said in her Oct. 11 speech at a gathering marking National Uprising Day at the Macedonian Consulate General in Venice, Italy.

According to an official press release, Siljanovska Davkova told the attendees, Italy's Macedonian diaspora community members, that the emigration of young people has become the greatest threat to the country's future. 

She also called on Macedonians in Italy to help the state prevent the exodus through actively participating in policy creation and decision-making.

"To prevent the exodus, we also need help from the diaspora. We need your ideas, your knowledge, your experience and your more active participation in policy-making and decision-making here at home, which is our duty, and not yours," the Macedonian president said.

"My commitment to the diaspora is not just election rhetoric. Our government is preparing a five-year national strategy for the diaspora," she said, adding that the strategy would make it possible for diaspora community members to actively take part in the public discourse and in strengthening the state.

She also said she intended to form a Presidential Office Diaspora Council. 

"Of course, who will sit there will be up to you. You know each other better. Your experiences and insights are invaluable to us, and to me personally, too," President Siljanovska Davkova said.

She pointed out that countries with strong diaspora communities prospered while countries with weak diaspora communities stagnated.

"Especially since Macedonian independence, the success of our homeland has been measured by whether it is a decent place to live and whether it provides all of its citizens equal chances for progress, regardless of their ethnic, religious or any other affiliation," she said.

"The diaspora must be an equal partner in our most important endeavor – to make the country a standard European country where young people will stay, or come to, or have contact with," she said, adding that the country should also make "you, the emigrants, proud" not only to visit but also to return to for good.

Earlier Saturday, she met with representatives of local Macedonian associations and of the Macedonian Orthodox Church and the Islamic Religious Community, the release said. mr/