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Macedonia holds local polls runoff

Around 833,000 voters in Macedonia headed to polling stations on Sunday October 29 to cast their vote for the second round of the local elections to elect new mayors and heads of communes.

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The polling stations closed at 7 pm while the turnout in the second round of polls stood at 43.83 percent by 17:00, Macedonia's State Election Commission (SEC) Spokesperson Ljupka Gugucevska told reporters Sunday evening.

According to Gugucevska, voting was closed successfully while she noted that no major incidents were recorded during the day.

During the day, election body said it had received four complaints from citizens who were not included in the Voter List, but they were rejected as the complainants were issued personal identification documents.

The first round of local elections was held on Oct. 15 when the Social Democratic Union (SDSM) majority claimed victory in most of the local units.

According to Macedonia's election authority, in the first round of voting, the ruling SDSM -- chaired by Prime Minister Zoran Zaev -- won 46 communes and the city of Skopje, the biggest administrative units in the country.

Meanwhile, the largest opposition party VMRO-DPMNE chaired by former PM Nikola Gruevski only won three communes while ethnic Albanian party DUI won one commune.

Thirty-four other communes in the country went to runoff Sunday as in these communes, none of the candidates managed to get over 50 percent of votes.

Macedonia local elections: SDSM claims victory, VMRO-DPMNE refuses to recognise results

Macedonian Social Democratic Union (SDSM) and Democratic Union for Integration (BDI) have celebrated their victory in the Republic of Macedonia’s local government elections, saying that the elections were democratic.

VMRO-DPMNE said that it does not the result of these elections, and is requesting snap parliamentary elections.

Meanwhile, Alliance for Albanians and BESA Movement did not recognize the result either. Following the October 29 second round of elections, SDSM won in 57 communes, BDI won in 11 communes, VMRO-DPMNE won in five communes, Alliance for Albanians won in three communes, Turkish Party won in two communes, Besa Movement won in one commune and three other communes were won by independent candidates.

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Xinhua

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