Skopje, 5 August 2025 (MIA) - It is unsportsmanlike to abuse sports grounds to exercise hate speech, insults and satanization with poisonous, murderous words – projectiles! After so many human battles lost on the sports grounds, we must say it loud and clear: Never again, wherever we are, whoever we are competing against, will we allow the sports ground to grow into a gladiator cheering arena, said President Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova in response to the chanting at the basketball match between Macedonia and Romania.

In a post on Facebook on Tuesday, the President noted that the reactions to the incident rightfully continue.

“And due to our, for who knows how many times, sporting illiteracy, the reactions to the horrific incident at the basketball game in Kumanovo rightfully continue. A few senseless fans fired bullets of hate at our fellow Albanian citizens, but they struck us all, including themselves, and once again, we are ashamed,” the President said.

In the post titled “Lesson (not) learned”, Siljanovska-Davkova noted that the country has not learned its lesson after the match between Shkëndija and Welsh champion TNS held in mid-July.

“In mid-July, at the match between Shkëndija and Welsh champion TNS, with the racist insults against footballer Aramide Oteh, we shocked the entire sporting world, but also the broader world which rightly asked: how is it possible for a senseless supporter to emotionally break a top footballer pushing him to tears, by reaching for hate speech on a racial basis? The shame fell to everyone: the host, the club, the attendees, the city, the country, the sport! The logical conclusion was: ‘Such behavior mustn’t be tolerated on any stadium, in any sport, never and nowhere,’” Siljanovska-Davkova said.

She said the first lesson about proper cheering is learned at home, and then in the educational institutions and at the match.

“Perhaps as a starting point, before every match, a warning message should be sent to the spectators to switch off bad thoughts and messages, just as they do with their mobile phones, because the match is not a battle to the death, but a chivalrous fight toward a deserved victory, and that the audience is expected to cheer, support, and encourage, and not to insult and harm, that the better team should win, but the other should also be respected, that the cheering should be a reward, not a punishment. Let me remind you that the shame doesn’t fall only on those whose words wound, because they affect not only those in the hall or on the ground, but also those who watch and listen due to their unlimited reach,” Siljanovska-Davkova said.

We must stand up against hateful cheering, Siljanovska-Davkova said, adding that cheering must be ennobled, we must learn how to cheer and strengthen the fight against prejudice and conflict between “those who are different”.

“Passionate cheering is never offensive or aggressive. We need an alphabet of cheering as a form of sporting enjoyment, a cheering literacy, because a sporting victory is a Pyrrhic one if it is accompanied by physical or verbal aggression,” Siljanovska-Davkova stressed.

The chanting at the match was also condemned by Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski, Parliament Speaker Afrim Gashi, political parties in the country, the Municipality of Kumanovo...

The Basic Public Prosecutor’s Office in Kumanovo said it is taking action and has issued several orders and directives to the Kumanovo Police Department for investigating elements of criminal offenses related to chants containing hate speech by currently unknown individuals during the basketball match between the national teams of Macedonia and Romania. They also indicated that an order has been issued to obtain video surveillance footage for the purpose of identifying possible perpetrators.

MIA file photo