The government is taking seven million euros from Macedonian Air Navigation to repay a loan to a Chinese bank for motorways. When the prime minister was asked about it, the answer was more interesting than the question - the money is not only coming from MNAV.

„Not only from M-NAV, we also have funds from the Lottery, MEPSO and the road company's own funds. The money will be used to repay the loan to the Chinese bank for the motorways, and those same funds will be returned to the companies in August”, said Hristijan Mickoski. He added that this is standard procedure, done in the past as well.

Three state enterprises and one loan

The decision on the short-term loan was signed on 17 July and adopted at a government session on 14 July, where the table of conclusions contains only a brief note on borrowing for the Public Enterprise for State Roads. The loan is interest-free, with a repayment deadline of 30 November 2026.

So: three state companies lend money to a third state institution so it can pay an instalment to a foreign bank, and all of it is supposed to come back in August. If that is normal procedure, then normal procedure involves a budget that in July cannot cover a single instalment without money circling around inside the state.

The questions that go unanswered

Neither MNAV nor the other parties involved offered any further explanation. The Ministry of Transport and Communications forwarded the question to the Public Enterprise for State Roads, and the head of that enterprise, former Skopje mayor Koce Trajanovski, had no comment.

Biljana Ivanovska, former head of the Anti-Corruption Commission, warned that care must be taken not to create the wrong impression in public, particularly when state aid is granted on favourable terms. In her view, in this specific case the consultation with the international factor cannot be ignored - if MNAV decides to lend the money, it must inform Eurocontrol and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, from which it has taken a loan for equipment and modernisation.

The opposition SDSM read this as proof that there is no money in the budget and that the economy is collapsing. That is a party assessment and should be taken as one. But the fact that an enterprise with its own credit obligations to foreign institutions is now lending money to the government is not a party assessment - it is a signature on a document dated 17 July.

August will show whether the money came back. That is the date worth writing down, because a repaid loan is a procedure, and an unrepaid loan is something else.