Gruevski Will 'Take Responsibility' for Macedonia Poll Defeat

Asked whether he would resign if his party loses the October 15 local elections in Macedonia, former PM Gruevski - whose VMRO DPMNE party ran Macedonia for 11 years until recently - said only that he would assume responsibility for the result, whatever it was.

In that case, "the party leader bears the biggest responsibility", Gruevski briefly told the Albanian-language TV station Alsat on Tuesday. However, he insisted he was confident of victory in the local election.

After losing power in May following a prolonged political crisis in which he was accused of masterminding a massive wiretapping scheme and of other crimes, the local elections are seen as an important test of whether Gruevski will be able to remain party leader, amid growing discontent within the party's ranks.

Macedonia's Special Prosecution, SJO, which is tasked with probing high-level crime, has filed several charges against him and has opened several other investigations.

However, he has denied guilt of any offences.

"That is a classical politically-motivated witch hunt," Gruevski said, accusing the now ruling Social Democrats, SDSM, who took power in May, of instigating it.

"This witch hunt is mostly directed against VMRO DPMNE and officials from the past government. The goal is to defocus the public. Instead of dealing with problems that are of concern to citizens, like wages, jobs, subsidies for agriculture and EU and NATO membership, they [the new government] instigate witch hunts," he said.

Formed in autumn 2015 as part of an EU-sponsored crisis agreement, the SJO has pressed charges in 20 cases, mostly against officials from VMRO DPMNE. It is also working on more than 120 investigations and pre-investigation procedures.