The government has proposed amendments to the Law on Mineral Resources. VMRO-DPMNE says they strengthen environmental protection, SDSM says they are preparing ecological genocide and plunder, and environmental organisations are chanting that nature is not for sale.

According to the government, the changes are directed exclusively at public enterprises and minerals of public interest - coal and strategic resources. Environmental standards are not being changed, impact assessments remain mandatory, and inspection and control mechanisms are retained. It all sounds reasonable - when you read the government's press release.

The opposition and environmental groups see it differently: if the amendments are so harmless, why are they being pushed through in a rush, without broad debate? The practice of exclusively for the public interest has historically surprised citizens in this country when the actual beneficiaries were eventually revealed. A hundred amendments in Parliament against the draft law suggest the opposition believes something was hidden behind the wording.

Macedonia's minerals exist, the need to manage them is real. But the way laws regulating raw materials are passed - without transparency, in haste, with mutual back-patting - is a recipe for future scandals.