Erasing your past, obliterating your future
By: Jason Miko
Tags: Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia

Erasing your past, obliterating your future

“The first step in liquidating a people is to erase its memory. Destroy its books, its culture, its history…. Before long the nation will begin to forget what it is and what it was.” — Milan Kundera

“The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” — George Orwell

“To destroy a people, you must first sever their roots.” — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

“The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became the truth.” — George Orwell

The Government of Zoran Zaev, engulfed in an epic scandal that will bring it down, is simultaneously working to erase Macedonia’s identity, Macedonia’s history, Macedonia’s heritage, Macedonia’s culture and thus, Macedonia’s future. As the above quotes from individuals with wisdom attest to, you cannot have a future if you erase, forget, deny, obliterate and destroy your past.

When Zaev, his foreign minister, Nikola Dimitrov, and other members of his government signed the so-called “Prespa agreement” and then both ignored the consent of the governed (by ignoring the September 30, 2018 referendum) and rammed through the name change in parliament (using the “Balkan approach” that the EU’s Johannes Hahn recommended), they committed themselves to the destruction of Macedonia’s identity.

A brief focus on the various ways in which Zaev is effectuating this erasure is in order:

-First — and this one is insidious because it is growing in scope and frequency — more and more media outlets and individuals, around the region and the world, are referring to Macedonians and things that should simply be identified “Macedonian” as “North Macedonians.” I maintain a list of examples here and update it regularly. Remember, this is not exhaustive, it’s just a list of ones I have found.

-Second, at the beginning of August, Macedonians reported receiving birth certificates with a ///// symbol in place of the adjective “Macedonian.” Macedonians were naturally outraged and with the outrage the Zaev Government quickly issued an explanation, blaming it all on “technical issues,” and stating that “citizenship will be listed as ‘Macedonian/citizen of the Republic of North Macedonia’, a phrase specifically detailed in the Prespa treaty to declare the Macedonian nationality.” But here’s an arresting point: setting aside the asininity of the entire so-called “Prespa agreement” and looking only at what it says, Article 1(3)(b) states “The nationality of the Second Party shall be Macedonian/citizen of the Republic of North Macedonia, as it will be registered in all travel documents,” and the last time I checked, a birth certificate is not a travel document. Likewise, citizenship certificates have the same formula despite the fact that they are not travel documents.

-Third, and as I write this, the Government of Zoran Zaev is forcibly removing, from the public square, the Star of Kutlesh, a symbol found on old cultural artifacts and ancient everyday items dug up from the ground and found all over Macedonia. This symbol, by virtue of is ubiquity throughout the country, has come to be embraced by Macedonians as a part of Macedonia’s culture and heritage. And yet the Government of Zoran Zaev is erasing it throughout Macedonia, using power tools to literally erase it from, in one example, manhole covers. And it is interesting to note: some of the photos of those manhole covers where workers are physically removing it have a date of 2004 and 2005 on them — meaning they were installed by SDSM.

The Star of Kutlesh will be returned, at some point, to public spaces and squares because it belongs to the Macedonians. The Greeks can claim it as well (they claim a different style and color pattern), as it is found on their land too. But for now, the public should be encouraged to use it as much as possible and as publicly as possible, and in fact, a backlash has occurred — it is being used more and more around Macedonia and around the world as Macedonians, rightfully, embrace it.

-Fourth, let’s not forget Macedonia’s children and youth who are taught in Macedonia’s schools and will now be taught a history that is compliant with whatever the Greeks and Bulgarians say. The so-called committees between Macedonia and Bulgaria and Macedonia and Greece are working now to revise Macedonia’s schoolbooks, textbooks, maps, atlases and teaching guides. I had some thoughts on what can be done to counter this in a column I published back in February titled “Teach your children, Macedonia.”

-Fifth, don’t forget what is coming: business names, trademarks and many more things which should be the sole domain of the private sector — businesses, organizations, institutions, foundations, civil society organizations, etc. — they will all face growing pressure from the Government of Zoran Zaev to remove any mention of “Made in Macedonia,” “Macedonian Product,” or even just in an address listing such as “Skopje, Macedonia.” Unless, of course, the Government of Zoran Zaev is no more.

-Sixth, I don’t even have room here to mention what Ali Ahmeti, DUI, the Alliance of Albanians, Besa, and other Macedonian-Albanians have demanded — and received — but you can read their so-called “Tirana Platform” — arrogantly and deliberately issued on Orthodox Christmas Day, January 7, 2017, here.

In all of this it seems that with Zaev readily agreeing with the Bulgarians, Greeks and the Albanians to their various demands that Zaev actually does believe that Macedonia is an invention of Tito.

Last thought this week: Back in 2018 when the so-called “name negotiations” were still ongoing, Nikola Dimitrov told Greek newspaper Kathimerini, “We were and will be Macedonians.”

But being “Macedonian” is not some abstraction — a name without anything behind it. It has a rich history, culture, heritage, language, faith and much more. You cannot take away what it means to be a Macedonian — that rich history, culture, heritage, language, faith and much more — and then claim to be a Macedonian. Shorn of all that, to be a “Macedonian” means what, exactly? And yet Zaev, Dimitrov and the other members of the government are attempting to change what it means to be a Macedonian into something it never was — empty and hollowed out of its own unique characteristics.

The basic plan of the Greeks is to remove any talk of a Macedonian identity and obliterate any reference to such an identity. The basic plan of the Bulgarians is to have the Macedonians admit that they are “Bulgarian.” The “brilliance” of both of their plans is that they have a willing and eager quisling to do it for them — the Prime Minister of Macedonia, Zoran Zaev.