Process of constitutional amendments should be sped up, says Osmani
Skopje, 28 October 2022 (MIA) – Foreign Minister Bujar Osmani believes the process of constitutional amendments should take place with accelerated dynamics, because the momentum in the negotiations with the EU should not be lost.
“If you lose the momentum, it is most difficult to get it back. Politicians who have experience in the European process know that the momentum is now and we must not miss it. And, I don’t think that the next elections should be a referendum on the constitutional changes, but they should be elections for a better standard of citizens and the rule of law,” FM Osmani said in response to a reporter’s question to comment on President Stevo Pendarovski’s statement who said recently that the process of constitutional revision should not be rushed.
As regards whether the government has strategy on how to get two-thirds majority for the constitutional amendments, he said that negotiations with the EU provide security, standards, and protected identity attributes, adding that the citizens are starting to see and support that.
“That is our strategy and I think it will slowly get to the MPs. It is increasingly understood that we got the beginning of negotiations, protected identity attributes and constitutional amendments, which will protect those identity attributes even further, because for the first time the two communities are constitutionally defined as majority and minority, which is contrary to the positions of the most radical structures in Bulgaria, who are against the constitutional amendments. Therefore, whoever is against the constitutional amendments is actually in line with the most radical structures in Bulgaria. I think that time allows these messages to reach the citizens,” said Osmani.
According to him, there must be a social agreement that 2030 will be the year when the country joins the EU. “We can undermine each other, but we will also undermine our agenda for 2030,” Osmani told Friday’s press briefing in Skopje.
