When will North Macedonia join the EU?: Seventeen years of wasted waiting

Marko Trosanovski is Chair of the Institute for Democracy in Skopje and political adviser.

When German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier visits North Macedonia for the first time this Tuesday, he will come to a country that has been a candidate for accession to the European Union for 17 years. Membership is still awaited in Skopje. A lot has changed since the country became a candidate in 2005, not just its name. Because the country’s change of name – from Macedonia to North Macedonia – was made a condition of EU accession by neighboring Greece to the south.

With the name change, which was agreed between the two countries in the Prespa Agreement in 2019, the Greeks gave up their opposition to a possible NATO and EU accession of North Macedonia. It joined NATO a year later. However, progress towards full EU membership was a long time coming. Disappointed by the long wait for EU membership, the people of North Macedonia today feel they have given up their country’s name on a promise that has not yet been fulfilled.

Historical conflict with Bulgaria

But there are not only disputes with Greece, but also with Bulgaria, the neighbor to the east. Bulgaria was the first country to recognize the independence of the then Republic of Macedonia after the collapse of Yugoslavia. However, the country refused to recognize the existence of a separate Macedonian nation and language. For Bulgaria, the ethnic Macedonians are just a subgroup of the Bulgarian nation and the Macedonian language is just a Bulgarian dialect.

Nevertheless, in North Macedonia it was assumed that Bulgaria would never openly obstruct the prospect of accession, but rather supported it. Today this appears to have been more of a – strategic – camouflage role played by the country. To the great disappointment of North Macedonia, in 2020 Bulgaria unilaterally and arbitrarily rejected the text of the negotiating framework for EU accession proposed by the German EU Council Presidency.

In order to eliminate the potential for conflict between the two countries before North Macedonia joins the EU, a Bulgarian-Macedonian commission of historians was set up in 2018. However, there were always irreconcilable differences. To break the stalemate, President Macron proposed a constitutional amendment allowing North Macedonia to recognize the Bulgarian minority, which makes up 0.2 percent of the population. In order not to further delay the accession process, North Macedonia agreed this summer.

In addition to the usual performance criteria of an accession process based on the Copenhagen criteria, the results of the commission of historians are to be included in the assessment of whether the country is making sufficient progress in the negotiations. This is a precedent that has little to do with a performance-based process. It opens Pandora’s box for expansion in the Balkans, where historical and identity disputes are not uncommon.

Disappointed in the EU

That the EU has made history a criterion for EU membership has angered, frustrated and disillusioned many people in North Macedonia. A majority of the population can hardly identify with the new country name and are resentful of the concessions made to Brussels to adapt their own country’s history. As a result, many North Macedonians are becoming increasingly cautious about EU integration. Most young people see their future outside the country anyway. Important workers migrate with them – a trend that the local economy can hardly absorb.

Opinion polls confirm the new Euroscepticism. The number of supporters of membership is consistently over 70 percent. However, only a third of the population now believes that North Macedonia has made progress in the EU accession process since 2005. At the same time, fewer and fewer North Macedonians believe that internal reforms are enough to finally be accepted as a full EU member.

In addition, more and more people are losing confidence in democracy. Only every second North Macedonian is still convinced of this form of government. Within a year, the number dropped by 10 percent. Trust in the institutions also continues to decline. The judiciary takes last place: people consider the judicial system to be completely unjust and corrupt.

North Macedonia has had many painful experiences in recent years, going from being Europe’s model to being fostered. It was hailed as an “oasis of peace” in a war-torn Balkans in the 1990s, a successful model of inter-ethnic integration, and a champion of EU integration in the early 2000s.

Since North Macedonia gained candidate status in 2005, belief in Europe has been severely shaken. With his visit, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier has the opportunity to pave the way for restoring the trust that has been lost.

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