VMRO women leave Skopje cold and starved

Members of the VMRO-DPMNE Union of Women left Skopje cold and starved. A large number of buses from throughout the country transported several thousand women today, in order for them to participate at the party conference. This morning they stood in the cold waiting to get on the buses, freezing in the Jane Sandanski Sport Arena (former MZT sport arena), Skopje, and then lined up, starved, began to board the busses to return home.

Today, for the first time, as some women say, participants of the party event, they will return home to their towns without the usual brunch at the party’s expense. The sandwiches were missing from the agenda. Only those who could afford it went to lunch, while the others are waiting for the “free time” to pass before they leave for their home towns.

Even though some of them had instructions that they were to have protests in front of the SDSM headquarters on Bihacka street in Skopje this afternoon, the busses left, to the relief of many of the frozen women.

As we already stated today, the women of VMRO-DPMNE came to Skopje today following strong party pressure and intimidations from the directors of the public enterprises in which they are employed in. Their presence to the party event was mandatory, conditioned with the non-extension of their existing employment contracts, or with the cutting of their daily wages, even though Sunday is a non-working day for everyone. Presence, for those members who at the moment were using their right to annual leave, was also mandatory. Not even the municipal administration was excluded. Lists were being checked and the exact number was being determined the bay before the conference.

Last week, the women of VMRO-DPMNE, one by one, were all invited by the directors of the institution in which they work, communal enterprises, primary, secondary, urban or rural schools, health institutions and many other. During those meetings, according to observers and citizen journalists, “face to face”, they were all threatened that their absence could entail serious consequences.

This morning, men could be spotted at the gathering points carrying lists in their hands, checking to see if the women would fulfill their party orders.

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