North Macedonia Ruling Party Axes Top Officials

North Macedonia's Prime Minister and leader of its ruling Social Democratic Party, SDSM, Zoran Zaev, on Sunday said a promised "clean-up" launched after lower than expected results in recent presidential polls would not go without a mass cull of party officials - and will soon include ministers.

"We have promised substantial changes and they are happening," Zaev said on Sunday evening after a meeting of the party's central committee.

The party dismissed all six of its vice presidents, Frosina Remenski, Oliver Spasovski, Muhamed Zeqiri, Petre Shilegov, Blagoj Bocvarski and Damjan Mancevski. Their successors will be elected at a later stage.

The party also dismissed Aleksandar Kiracovski as general secretary. He was replaced with Ljupco Nikolovski, who will leave his current position as agriculture minister.

Prime Minister Zaev said changes within the cabinet will follow within the next month, adding that at least three ministers will face the axe.

"Everywhere where results are lacking, or [officials] have shown arrogance, there will be changes," Zaev said.

The party previously dismissed 78 heads of its municipal branches.

Zaev announced the changes within his party but also within the cabinet immediately after the disappointing results of the first round of the April and May presidential elections.

Although the candidate endorsed by the ruling parties, Stevo Pendarovski, won the presidency, the results signaled a worrying loss of support for the ruling parties.

The purge comes roughly in the middle of the four-year term of Zaev's pro-European government, which came to power in 2017, ending the authoritarian rule of the right-wing former PM Nikola Gruevski.