Democracy
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HRF classifies North Macedonia as democratic.
North Macedonia is a parliamentary republic with a unicameral legislature (Sobranie), a strong executive, and a presidency with mostly symbolic functions. Members of Parliament, between 120 and 123, serve four-year terms. Amendments to the Electoral Code in 2015 allowed for electing up to three additional MPs, depending on the proportion of votes cast abroad. The Supreme Court is the highest judicial instance of general review, while the Constitutional Court reviews the constitutionality of statutes and legislation. As North Macedonia democratized in the 1990s, dozens of new political parties emerged and successfully competed in elections. Nonetheless, the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization–Democratic Party for Macedonian National Unity (VMRO-DPMNE) remained preeminent, serving as the backbone of governing coalitions for much of the 2000s and early 2010s. During its 10-year rule (2006-2017), the VMRO-DPMNE considerably eroded democratic checks and balances. The party misused state resources to skew the electoral playing field in its favor and unduly influenced judiciary members to secure rulings conducive to its interests. A 2015 wiretapping scandal, which implicated senior VMRO-DPMNE members in election fraud and abuse of power, precipitated mass protests and ultimately a transfer of power away from the governing party. Between 2017 and 2024, the Social Democratic Movement (SDSM) was at the helm of government. During its tenure, North Macedonia signed the landmark 2018 Prespa Agreement with Greece, which ended a decades-long dispute. In the 2024 presidential and parliamentary elections, the SDSM was ultimately defeated in a landslide by the VMRO-DPMNE, which has been in office since, together with its coalition partners, VLEN/VREDI and ZNAM.
National elections are largely free and fair. In contrast with prior election cycles, when the VMRO-DPMNE enjoyed significant unfair campaign advantages, including unequal media representation and abuse of administrative resources, the 2024, 2020, and 2016 parliamentary elections were well-administered and genuinely competitive. As evident from transfers of power between the dominant VMRO-DPMNE and SDSM parties, political actors campaign in a generally level playing field and have ample opportunities to engage voters.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public are largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. During its tenure, the Social Democratic Movement (SDSM) implemented several policies bolstering media independence, such as empowering the Special Prosecutor’s Office to investigate crimes against journalists and introducing amendments to the Criminal Code that significantly reduced punishments for defamation and slander. Civil society is robust, and freedom of assembly is generally respected. There is little evidence to suggest that the VMRO-DPMNE has substantively reversed those policies and eroded the freedom of dissent since coming back into office in 2024.
In North Macedonia, institutions are somewhat independent but frequently constrained by the government, due in no small part to the legacies of previous executive interference and the slow pace and limited scope of subsequent reforms. The SDSM initiated an ambitious plan to transform the judiciary, but progress remained uneven. Nonetheless, the courts have upheld electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in a number of consequential cases. In addition, they have held some public officials accountable for wrongdoings brought to light in the 2015 wiretapping scandal, including former PM Nikola Gruevski. Independent oversight bodies, some of which the VMRO-DPMNE sought to capture during its tenure, have an uneven track record of checking the executive and ensuring transparency and accountability in governance.
Elections in North Macedonia are largely free and fair. The playing field has long been dominated by the two main rival parties, the VMRO-DPMNE and the SDSM. While international observers have assessed the last three parliamentary elections (2024, 2020, 2016) as fundamentally competitive, some concerns regarding the misuse of administrative resources during campaigns and the disproportionate media representation of the contenders remain. On the other hand, the public outcry and international criticism prompted by a 2015 wiretapping scandal precipitated thorough electoral reforms that significantly bolstered the fairness and transparency of subsequent elections.
While the VMRO-DPMNE enjoyed significant unfair campaign advantages during its previous tenure (2006-2017), subsequent elections have taken place in a significantly more level playing field, as demonstrated by recent transfers of power. More specifically, the party benefited from disproportionate, overwhelmingly positive media coverage, underpinned by the opaque allocation of state advertising contracts to regime-friendly outlets. Under the leadership of former PM Nikola Gruevski, the government also repeatedly circumvented restrictions on hiring civil servants in election years (e.g., 2014), establishing clientelistic networks that likely bolstered the VMRO-DPMNE’s performance at the polls. To illustrate, shortly before the 2014 parliamentary elections, multiple public institutions, including the Ministry of Finance and several municipalities, announced a large number of unspecified “temporary” vacancies, allocating some 150,000 USD of the state budget for remuneration. Local legal experts sharply criticized these hiring procedures as inconsistent with both campaign regulations and the legal definition of “temporary” employment, which had hitherto applied only to seasonal workers. In addition, the OSCE reported accounts of potential voter intimidation in the 2014 and 2011 parliamentary elections. A recording leaked as part of the 2015 wiretapping scandal also indicated that VMRO-DPMNE officials had pressured civil service employees to participate in party activities, such as political rallies, counter-protests, and social media campaigns. Indicating the mainstream opposition’s perceived inability to compete on an equal footing under such circumstances, the VMRO-DPMNE’s main rival, the SDSM, initiated a boycott of Parliament following the 2014 legislative elections, denouncing the results as fraudulent. However, there was no indication that electoral irregularities had significantly impacted the final outcome of the election, as the OSCE considered it “efficiently administered.”
By contrast, the following three electoral cycles were markedly more competitive. International observers, such as the OSCE, assessed the 2024 parliamentary and presidential elections positively, noting largely equitable campaign opportunities and more transparent conduct of voting and tabulation procedures by the State Electoral Commission. Nonetheless, the OSCE flagged some concerns, noting, for instance, that close to 90% of the state subsidies for campaign activities (e.g., airtime, billboards, event management) were allocated to the four biggest parties in the outgoing parliament (the VMRO-DPMNE, the SDSM, BDI/DUI, and Besa). This limited the capacity of smaller or newly established parties to compete. Observers also pointed out that multiple public officials from different political parties inaugurated public work projects close to election day, in direct violation of the Election Code, which prohibits such announcements within that time window. Moreover, the State Commission for Prevention of Corruption (SCPC) did not intervene to check the practice, which blurs the lines between state and party, and sanction the officials responsible. However, the outcome, a landslide victory for the VMRO-DPMNE, which gained 43% of the popular vote while SDSM plummeted to 15%, suggests that these structural factors did not systematically favor the incumbent (SDSM).
Despite these outstanding shortcomings in campaign regulation, the legal framework for holding elections is generally robust, and recent governments have not engaged in electoral law manipulation or irregularities to hold onto power. On the contrary, the opposition had long demanded thorough reforms of the Election Code while the VMRO-DPMNE was still in office (2006-2017). The 2015 wiretapping scandal, which exposed the governing party’s reliance on illicit voter mobilization and pressure on civil servants during elections, provided further impetus to those demands. As a result, a 2016 agreement between North Macedonia’s major political actors brought about a substantive revision of outdated voter lists (which had enabled the manipulation of final results), among other key measures guaranteeing electoral integrity. As assessed by international observers, these measures significantly improved conditions for free and fair elections in subsequent cycles.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public are largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. Recent legal amendments have bolstered protections for journalists and activists, while limiting the potential abuse of speech laws to silence dissent somewhat. The deregulation of political advertising on public and private channels has raised some concerns regarding the editorial independence of these outlets. On the other hand, civil society is robust, and the freedom of assembly is generally upheld in practice.
The last two governments have not seriously intimidated or obstructed the work of independent and dissenting media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, or members of the general public. On the contrary, the SDSM pursued reforms aiming to discourage the potential harassment and intimidation of journalists between 2017 and 2020. Amendments to the Law on Civil Liability for Defamation decreased potential fines for journalists and critical media outlets, aiming to discourage vexatious lawsuits, a tactic VMRO-DPMNE members had abused frequently in the last decade. Following 2021 amendments to the Criminal Code, developed in consultation with civil society, attacks on journalists can be punished with the same severity as crimes against public officials. To illustrate, the maximum punishment for physically assaulting a journalist increased from three months to three years imprisonment. The Special Prosecutor’s Office was also empowered to investigate crimes against media workers. Despite the VMRO-DPMNE’s historically adversarial rhetoric towards independent journalists, the party has not pursued policies undermining these advancements since coming back into office.
At the same time, both parties (albeit to a different extent) have enabled governments to unfairly skew media coverage in their favor. In 2017, the SDSM-led parliament banned the government and municipalities from running publicly funded media campaigns on private media channels, a practice that the VMRO-DPMNE had systematically abused to reward particular loyal outlets (to the amount of approx. $28 million between 2006 and 2016). The SDSM reversed course and lifted the ban in 2024, prompting public outcry. Despite North Macedonia’s generally poor regulation of state advertising, prone to disadvantaging smaller and independent outlets, the country has a fairly resilient and diverse media sector with more than 130 registered TV and radio channels.
The government has not shut down major independent dissenting organizations. Virtually all governments since 1991, when Macedonia gained independence from the former Yugoslavia, have refrained from obstructing the work of non-governmental organizations while in office. Equally important, there are official avenues for CSOs to contribute to policy-making and monitoring, such as the Council for Cooperation between the Government and Civil Society, the National Council for EU Integration, and the Council for Open Government.
The government has not seriously and unfairly repressed protests or gatherings. To illustrate, the mass protests against the government of Nikola Gruevski following the wiretapping scandal (2015) and against PM Zoran Zaev, who considered an agreement with Bulgaria in 2022 (known as the French proposal) to recognize North Macedonia’s Bulgarian minority in the Constitution, proceeded without undue interference by law enforcement. Following a deadly nightclub fire in the town of Kochani in 2025, mass protests demanded accountability for the severe safety violations, linked to corruption and regulatory failures, that contributed to the deaths of 59 patrons. Some of their organizers were smeared in government-friendly outlets, portrayed as seeking political gains or acting at the behest of foreign governments. Although concerning, these incidents were sporadic and have not created a lasting chilling effect.
In North Macedonia, institutions are somewhat independent, but have been frequently constrained by successive governments. The latter have either fomented (VMRO-DPMNE) or failed to address (SDSM) the judiciary’s ongoing vulnerability to executive interference, undermined the prosecution of high-level corruption, and weakened independent oversight bodies. On the other hand, the courts have a generally strong record of upholding electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in their rulings, indicating that corrective mechanisms are still in place.
The Gruevski governments (2006-2017) subjected the judiciary to reforms that seriously undermined its independence and operational effectiveness. It frequently abuses mechanisms for appointing and promoting judges (including through the subservient High Judicial Council formally in charge of these processes) to incentivize rulings favorable to its interests. In addition, the European Commission noted in its 2015 monitoring report that the system for random assignment of legal cases was subject to frequent manipulation to ensure only particular judges would rule on sensitive issues impinging on the regime’s interests, such as cases on high-level corruption. Combined with the de facto capture of the State Audit Office and the State Commission for Prevention of Corruption, the VMRO-DPMNE’s influence over the judiciary allowed it to engage in arguably unlawful tactics to skew electoral competition in its favor, such as circumventing restrictions on civil service hiring in election years, with impunity. Though the SDSM espoused an ambitious judicial reform program that addressed prior European Commission recommendations when it came to power in 2016, implementation has been flawed. For example, in 2023, the European Commission assessed there had been “little to no progress” in auditing and reforming the case management system or bolstering the independence of the High Judicial Council, even though the SDSM party had been continuously in office for six years at this point.
During its 2006-2017 tenure, the VMRO-DPMNE also subjected multiple independent oversight institutions to reforms or questionable leadership overhauls that abolished or seriously weakened their independence and operational effectiveness, a legacy that the subsequent SDSM-led governments didn’t thoroughly address. As a result, many of these agencies remained weakened and prone to politicization until the VMRO-DPMNE’s return to office in 2024. They included the Public Procurement Bureau (PPB), the body responsible for crucial oversight of public spending, whose composition the VMRO-DPMNE altered in 2008 in an arguably unlawful procedure. When EU representatives and domestic watchdogs pointed out the Bureau’s new members lacked the necessary qualifications, the party singlehandedly amended the law governing their appointment, formally lowering the criteria. VMRO-DPMNE pursued a similar strategy to weaken the State Commission for the Prevention of Corruption, appointing a loyalist with little professional experience in tackling high-profile corruption as chair in 2011. This appointment, in turn, helps explain why the agency did not intervene when the party enacted a questionable law shortly thereafter that loosened financial disclosure requirements for political parties. Lastly, the 2015 wiretapping revealed the extent to which the VMRO-DPMNE controlled the security services, which had, as it transpired, unlawfully surveilled prominent opposition members at the behest of government officials.
As previously suggested, the SDSM pursued meaningful reforms to undo the institutional capture it inherited from the VMRO-DPMNE, but these remained uneven and, on occasion, backslid. For instance, the former governing party ostensibly supported and empowered the specialized prosecution, chiefly the Special Public Prosecutor’s Office (SPO), established with direct EU support in response to the wiretapping scandal. While the SPO’s efforts were initially promising, a series of controversies diminished the office’s credibility: its leader, Katica Janeva, was implicated in corruption herself in 2019. The ensuing scandal led to the body’s dissolution shortly thereafter. Another one of the SDSM’s central judicial policies, vetting for judges and prosecutors, was poorly implemented. Finally, in 2023, the party adopted dubious amendments to the Criminal Code that reduced the statutes of limitations and sanctions for abuse of office and criminal association, directly undercutting ongoing efforts to hold political elites accountable. As a direct result, several high-profile cases were dismissed because the statute of limitations had expired. The European Union sharply criticized the amendments as inconsistent with North Macedonia’s formal commitment to the rule of law as a prospective member state. After returning to office, the VMRO-DPMNE has not necessarily weakened oversight bodies further, but efforts to tackle pervasive graft and improve transparency and governance effectiveness have largely stalled.
Reflecting this longstanding erosion, judicial and executive institutions have frequently and unfairly failed to hold government officials accountable, albeit with several notable exceptions. On the one hand, former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, who has been living in exile in Hungary since 2018, has been convicted on multiple charges in absentia. In 2022, he received a seven-year sentence for embezzling close to 1.5 million USD in party donations and a separate nine-year sentence for ordering the illegal demolition of a residential complex in 2011. The court considered the demolition order an act of political revenge against a former VMRO-DPMNE member who founded a small opposition political party to challenge Gruevski’s regime. However, given that Hungary granted the former prime minister asylum in 2018, and a Hungarian court denied an official request to extradite him the following year, it is unlikely Gruevski will serve any of these sentences. On the other hand, the controversial 2023 amendments to the Criminal Code mentioned previously directly hampered the prosecution of political elites. To illustrate the implications of these changes, in October 2023, the Skopje Criminal Court sparked controversy when it discontinued the retrial of former secret police chief Saso Mijalkov and other former members of his unit, ostensibly to comply with the newly amended Criminal Code. A lower court had found Mijalkov guilty of abuse of office for orchestrating the illegal surveillance of 4,200 phone numbers (that came to light in the 2015 wiretapping scandal) and sentenced him to 12 years in prison in 2021, but the Court of Appeals overturned the ruling and ordered a retrial. While the Prosecution stated its intent to prosecute Mijalkov’s remaining co-conspirators on slightly different charges, he will likely evade accountability. International experts criticized the obstacles to the effective investigation and prosecution of such crimes created by the 2023 amendments as a “matter of serious concern.”
In contrast with this mixed record of holding officials accountable, the courts have intervened in critical instances to protect electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent. The Constitutional Court played a pivotal role in enabling the transfer of power away from the ruling party in 2016. When the mainstream opposition decried the VMRO-DPMNE’s failure to fulfill the conditions of the 2015 agreement and declined to field candidates for the 2016 snap parliamentary elections in protest, as discussed under the Electoral Competition pillar, the Constitutional Court ruled that dissolving Parliament and calling an election in violation of the 2015 terms would be unconstitutional. The ruling compelled the VMRO-DPMNE to return to the negotiating table. It also precluded a national vote of questionable legitimacy that, in light of the opposition’s boycott, would have cemented the VMRO-DPMNE’s parliamentary majority for yet another term. The courts’ adjudication of strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs), gratuitous legal actions intended primarily at silencing the defendant, has been broadly consistent with EU freedom of expression standards. A 2022 report by the Association of Journalists of North Macedonia found that defamation and slander cases against journalists that reached the trial stage had considerably decreased since 2016, and that none resulted in convictions for journalists or critical media outlets in 2021 and 2022. Overall findings suggested that vexatious lawsuits do not seriously threaten media independence in North Macedonia, in contrast with other countries in the region.
HRF classifies North Macedonia as democratic.
North Macedonia is a parliamentary republic with a unicameral legislature (Sobranie), a strong executive, and a presidency with mostly symbolic functions. Members of Parliament, between 120 and 123, serve four-year terms. Amendments to the Electoral Code in 2015 allowed for electing up to three additional MPs, depending on the proportion of votes cast abroad. The Supreme Court is the highest judicial instance of general review, while the Constitutional Court reviews the constitutionality of statutes and legislation. As North Macedonia democratized in the 1990s, dozens of new political parties emerged and successfully competed in elections. Nonetheless, the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization–Democratic Party for Macedonian National Unity (VMRO-DPMNE) remained preeminent, serving as the backbone of governing coalitions for much of the 2000s and early 2010s. During its 10-year rule (2006-2017), the VMRO-DPMNE considerably eroded democratic checks and balances. The party misused state resources to skew the electoral playing field in its favor and unduly influenced judiciary members to secure rulings conducive to its interests. A 2015 wiretapping scandal, which implicated senior VMRO-DPMNE members in election fraud and abuse of power, precipitated mass protests and ultimately a transfer of power away from the governing party. Between 2017 and 2024, the Social Democratic Movement (SDSM) was at the helm of government. During its tenure, North Macedonia signed the landmark 2018 Prespa Agreement with Greece, which ended a decades-long dispute. In the 2024 presidential and parliamentary elections, the SDSM was ultimately defeated in a landslide by the VMRO-DPMNE, which has been in office since, together with its coalition partners, VLEN/VREDI and ZNAM.
National elections are largely free and fair. In contrast with prior election cycles, when the VMRO-DPMNE enjoyed significant unfair campaign advantages, including unequal media representation and abuse of administrative resources, the 2024, 2020, and 2016 parliamentary elections were well-administered and genuinely competitive. As evident from transfers of power between the dominant VMRO-DPMNE and SDSM parties, political actors campaign in a generally level playing field and have ample opportunities to engage voters.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public are largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. During its tenure, the Social Democratic Movement (SDSM) implemented several policies bolstering media independence, such as empowering the Special Prosecutor’s Office to investigate crimes against journalists and introducing amendments to the Criminal Code that significantly reduced punishments for defamation and slander. Civil society is robust, and freedom of assembly is generally respected. There is little evidence to suggest that the VMRO-DPMNE has substantively reversed those policies and eroded the freedom of dissent since coming back into office in 2024.
In North Macedonia, institutions are somewhat independent but frequently constrained by the government, due in no small part to the legacies of previous executive interference and the slow pace and limited scope of subsequent reforms. The SDSM initiated an ambitious plan to transform the judiciary, but progress remained uneven. Nonetheless, the courts have upheld electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in a number of consequential cases. In addition, they have held some public officials accountable for wrongdoings brought to light in the 2015 wiretapping scandal, including former PM Nikola Gruevski. Independent oversight bodies, some of which the VMRO-DPMNE sought to capture during its tenure, have an uneven track record of checking the executive and ensuring transparency and accountability in governance.
Elections in North Macedonia are largely free and fair. The playing field has long been dominated by the two main rival parties, the VMRO-DPMNE and the SDSM. While international observers have assessed the last three parliamentary elections (2024, 2020, 2016) as fundamentally competitive, some concerns regarding the misuse of administrative resources during campaigns and the disproportionate media representation of the contenders remain. On the other hand, the public outcry and international criticism prompted by a 2015 wiretapping scandal precipitated thorough electoral reforms that significantly bolstered the fairness and transparency of subsequent elections.
While the VMRO-DPMNE enjoyed significant unfair campaign advantages during its previous tenure (2006-2017), subsequent elections have taken place in a significantly more level playing field, as demonstrated by recent transfers of power. More specifically, the party benefited from disproportionate, overwhelmingly positive media coverage, underpinned by the opaque allocation of state advertising contracts to regime-friendly outlets. Under the leadership of former PM Nikola Gruevski, the government also repeatedly circumvented restrictions on hiring civil servants in election years (e.g., 2014), establishing clientelistic networks that likely bolstered the VMRO-DPMNE’s performance at the polls. To illustrate, shortly before the 2014 parliamentary elections, multiple public institutions, including the Ministry of Finance and several municipalities, announced a large number of unspecified “temporary” vacancies, allocating some 150,000 USD of the state budget for remuneration. Local legal experts sharply criticized these hiring procedures as inconsistent with both campaign regulations and the legal definition of “temporary” employment, which had hitherto applied only to seasonal workers. In addition, the OSCE reported accounts of potential voter intimidation in the 2014 and 2011 parliamentary elections. A recording leaked as part of the 2015 wiretapping scandal also indicated that VMRO-DPMNE officials had pressured civil service employees to participate in party activities, such as political rallies, counter-protests, and social media campaigns. Indicating the mainstream opposition’s perceived inability to compete on an equal footing under such circumstances, the VMRO-DPMNE’s main rival, the SDSM, initiated a boycott of Parliament following the 2014 legislative elections, denouncing the results as fraudulent. However, there was no indication that electoral irregularities had significantly impacted the final outcome of the election, as the OSCE considered it “efficiently administered.”
By contrast, the following three electoral cycles were markedly more competitive. International observers, such as the OSCE, assessed the 2024 parliamentary and presidential elections positively, noting largely equitable campaign opportunities and more transparent conduct of voting and tabulation procedures by the State Electoral Commission. Nonetheless, the OSCE flagged some concerns, noting, for instance, that close to 90% of the state subsidies for campaign activities (e.g., airtime, billboards, event management) were allocated to the four biggest parties in the outgoing parliament (the VMRO-DPMNE, the SDSM, BDI/DUI, and Besa). This limited the capacity of smaller or newly established parties to compete. Observers also pointed out that multiple public officials from different political parties inaugurated public work projects close to election day, in direct violation of the Election Code, which prohibits such announcements within that time window. Moreover, the State Commission for Prevention of Corruption (SCPC) did not intervene to check the practice, which blurs the lines between state and party, and sanction the officials responsible. However, the outcome, a landslide victory for the VMRO-DPMNE, which gained 43% of the popular vote while SDSM plummeted to 15%, suggests that these structural factors did not systematically favor the incumbent (SDSM).
Despite these outstanding shortcomings in campaign regulation, the legal framework for holding elections is generally robust, and recent governments have not engaged in electoral law manipulation or irregularities to hold onto power. On the contrary, the opposition had long demanded thorough reforms of the Election Code while the VMRO-DPMNE was still in office (2006-2017). The 2015 wiretapping scandal, which exposed the governing party’s reliance on illicit voter mobilization and pressure on civil servants during elections, provided further impetus to those demands. As a result, a 2016 agreement between North Macedonia’s major political actors brought about a substantive revision of outdated voter lists (which had enabled the manipulation of final results), among other key measures guaranteeing electoral integrity. As assessed by international observers, these measures significantly improved conditions for free and fair elections in subsequent cycles.
Independent media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, and members of the general public are largely free to openly criticize or challenge the government. Recent legal amendments have bolstered protections for journalists and activists, while limiting the potential abuse of speech laws to silence dissent somewhat. The deregulation of political advertising on public and private channels has raised some concerns regarding the editorial independence of these outlets. On the other hand, civil society is robust, and the freedom of assembly is generally upheld in practice.
The last two governments have not seriously intimidated or obstructed the work of independent and dissenting media, political leaders, civil society leaders, organizations, or members of the general public. On the contrary, the SDSM pursued reforms aiming to discourage the potential harassment and intimidation of journalists between 2017 and 2020. Amendments to the Law on Civil Liability for Defamation decreased potential fines for journalists and critical media outlets, aiming to discourage vexatious lawsuits, a tactic VMRO-DPMNE members had abused frequently in the last decade. Following 2021 amendments to the Criminal Code, developed in consultation with civil society, attacks on journalists can be punished with the same severity as crimes against public officials. To illustrate, the maximum punishment for physically assaulting a journalist increased from three months to three years imprisonment. The Special Prosecutor’s Office was also empowered to investigate crimes against media workers. Despite the VMRO-DPMNE’s historically adversarial rhetoric towards independent journalists, the party has not pursued policies undermining these advancements since coming back into office.
At the same time, both parties (albeit to a different extent) have enabled governments to unfairly skew media coverage in their favor. In 2017, the SDSM-led parliament banned the government and municipalities from running publicly funded media campaigns on private media channels, a practice that the VMRO-DPMNE had systematically abused to reward particular loyal outlets (to the amount of approx. $28 million between 2006 and 2016). The SDSM reversed course and lifted the ban in 2024, prompting public outcry. Despite North Macedonia’s generally poor regulation of state advertising, prone to disadvantaging smaller and independent outlets, the country has a fairly resilient and diverse media sector with more than 130 registered TV and radio channels.
The government has not shut down major independent dissenting organizations. Virtually all governments since 1991, when Macedonia gained independence from the former Yugoslavia, have refrained from obstructing the work of non-governmental organizations while in office. Equally important, there are official avenues for CSOs to contribute to policy-making and monitoring, such as the Council for Cooperation between the Government and Civil Society, the National Council for EU Integration, and the Council for Open Government.
The government has not seriously and unfairly repressed protests or gatherings. To illustrate, the mass protests against the government of Nikola Gruevski following the wiretapping scandal (2015) and against PM Zoran Zaev, who considered an agreement with Bulgaria in 2022 (known as the French proposal) to recognize North Macedonia’s Bulgarian minority in the Constitution, proceeded without undue interference by law enforcement. Following a deadly nightclub fire in the town of Kochani in 2025, mass protests demanded accountability for the severe safety violations, linked to corruption and regulatory failures, that contributed to the deaths of 59 patrons. Some of their organizers were smeared in government-friendly outlets, portrayed as seeking political gains or acting at the behest of foreign governments. Although concerning, these incidents were sporadic and have not created a lasting chilling effect.
In North Macedonia, institutions are somewhat independent, but have been frequently constrained by successive governments. The latter have either fomented (VMRO-DPMNE) or failed to address (SDSM) the judiciary’s ongoing vulnerability to executive interference, undermined the prosecution of high-level corruption, and weakened independent oversight bodies. On the other hand, the courts have a generally strong record of upholding electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent in their rulings, indicating that corrective mechanisms are still in place.
The Gruevski governments (2006-2017) subjected the judiciary to reforms that seriously undermined its independence and operational effectiveness. It frequently abuses mechanisms for appointing and promoting judges (including through the subservient High Judicial Council formally in charge of these processes) to incentivize rulings favorable to its interests. In addition, the European Commission noted in its 2015 monitoring report that the system for random assignment of legal cases was subject to frequent manipulation to ensure only particular judges would rule on sensitive issues impinging on the regime’s interests, such as cases on high-level corruption. Combined with the de facto capture of the State Audit Office and the State Commission for Prevention of Corruption, the VMRO-DPMNE’s influence over the judiciary allowed it to engage in arguably unlawful tactics to skew electoral competition in its favor, such as circumventing restrictions on civil service hiring in election years, with impunity. Though the SDSM espoused an ambitious judicial reform program that addressed prior European Commission recommendations when it came to power in 2016, implementation has been flawed. For example, in 2023, the European Commission assessed there had been “little to no progress” in auditing and reforming the case management system or bolstering the independence of the High Judicial Council, even though the SDSM party had been continuously in office for six years at this point.
During its 2006-2017 tenure, the VMRO-DPMNE also subjected multiple independent oversight institutions to reforms or questionable leadership overhauls that abolished or seriously weakened their independence and operational effectiveness, a legacy that the subsequent SDSM-led governments didn’t thoroughly address. As a result, many of these agencies remained weakened and prone to politicization until the VMRO-DPMNE’s return to office in 2024. They included the Public Procurement Bureau (PPB), the body responsible for crucial oversight of public spending, whose composition the VMRO-DPMNE altered in 2008 in an arguably unlawful procedure. When EU representatives and domestic watchdogs pointed out the Bureau’s new members lacked the necessary qualifications, the party singlehandedly amended the law governing their appointment, formally lowering the criteria. VMRO-DPMNE pursued a similar strategy to weaken the State Commission for the Prevention of Corruption, appointing a loyalist with little professional experience in tackling high-profile corruption as chair in 2011. This appointment, in turn, helps explain why the agency did not intervene when the party enacted a questionable law shortly thereafter that loosened financial disclosure requirements for political parties. Lastly, the 2015 wiretapping revealed the extent to which the VMRO-DPMNE controlled the security services, which had, as it transpired, unlawfully surveilled prominent opposition members at the behest of government officials.
As previously suggested, the SDSM pursued meaningful reforms to undo the institutional capture it inherited from the VMRO-DPMNE, but these remained uneven and, on occasion, backslid. For instance, the former governing party ostensibly supported and empowered the specialized prosecution, chiefly the Special Public Prosecutor’s Office (SPO), established with direct EU support in response to the wiretapping scandal. While the SPO’s efforts were initially promising, a series of controversies diminished the office’s credibility: its leader, Katica Janeva, was implicated in corruption herself in 2019. The ensuing scandal led to the body’s dissolution shortly thereafter. Another one of the SDSM’s central judicial policies, vetting for judges and prosecutors, was poorly implemented. Finally, in 2023, the party adopted dubious amendments to the Criminal Code that reduced the statutes of limitations and sanctions for abuse of office and criminal association, directly undercutting ongoing efforts to hold political elites accountable. As a direct result, several high-profile cases were dismissed because the statute of limitations had expired. The European Union sharply criticized the amendments as inconsistent with North Macedonia’s formal commitment to the rule of law as a prospective member state. After returning to office, the VMRO-DPMNE has not necessarily weakened oversight bodies further, but efforts to tackle pervasive graft and improve transparency and governance effectiveness have largely stalled.
Reflecting this longstanding erosion, judicial and executive institutions have frequently and unfairly failed to hold government officials accountable, albeit with several notable exceptions. On the one hand, former Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski, who has been living in exile in Hungary since 2018, has been convicted on multiple charges in absentia. In 2022, he received a seven-year sentence for embezzling close to 1.5 million USD in party donations and a separate nine-year sentence for ordering the illegal demolition of a residential complex in 2011. The court considered the demolition order an act of political revenge against a former VMRO-DPMNE member who founded a small opposition political party to challenge Gruevski’s regime. However, given that Hungary granted the former prime minister asylum in 2018, and a Hungarian court denied an official request to extradite him the following year, it is unlikely Gruevski will serve any of these sentences. On the other hand, the controversial 2023 amendments to the Criminal Code mentioned previously directly hampered the prosecution of political elites. To illustrate the implications of these changes, in October 2023, the Skopje Criminal Court sparked controversy when it discontinued the retrial of former secret police chief Saso Mijalkov and other former members of his unit, ostensibly to comply with the newly amended Criminal Code. A lower court had found Mijalkov guilty of abuse of office for orchestrating the illegal surveillance of 4,200 phone numbers (that came to light in the 2015 wiretapping scandal) and sentenced him to 12 years in prison in 2021, but the Court of Appeals overturned the ruling and ordered a retrial. While the Prosecution stated its intent to prosecute Mijalkov’s remaining co-conspirators on slightly different charges, he will likely evade accountability. International experts criticized the obstacles to the effective investigation and prosecution of such crimes created by the 2023 amendments as a “matter of serious concern.”
In contrast with this mixed record of holding officials accountable, the courts have intervened in critical instances to protect electoral integrity and the freedom of dissent. The Constitutional Court played a pivotal role in enabling the transfer of power away from the ruling party in 2016. When the mainstream opposition decried the VMRO-DPMNE’s failure to fulfill the conditions of the 2015 agreement and declined to field candidates for the 2016 snap parliamentary elections in protest, as discussed under the Electoral Competition pillar, the Constitutional Court ruled that dissolving Parliament and calling an election in violation of the 2015 terms would be unconstitutional. The ruling compelled the VMRO-DPMNE to return to the negotiating table. It also precluded a national vote of questionable legitimacy that, in light of the opposition’s boycott, would have cemented the VMRO-DPMNE’s parliamentary majority for yet another term. The courts’ adjudication of strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs), gratuitous legal actions intended primarily at silencing the defendant, has been broadly consistent with EU freedom of expression standards. A 2022 report by the Association of Journalists of North Macedonia found that defamation and slander cases against journalists that reached the trial stage had considerably decreased since 2016, and that none resulted in convictions for journalists or critical media outlets in 2021 and 2022. Overall findings suggested that vexatious lawsuits do not seriously threaten media independence in North Macedonia, in contrast with other countries in the region.
