Bitola prosecutor arrested, fake licence categories at the interior ministry, marijuana at Dojran, a hole in the pension fund

Prosecutors walked in on a prosecutor

Police in Prilep detained a prosecutor from the Higher Public Prosecutor's Office in Bitola, and the prosecutor's office for organised crime and corruption obtained court warrants to search his home and office. The suspicion is accepting a reward for unlawful influence. No name has been given officially, but unofficially the trail leads to businessman Borche Markovski's passport - the first defendant over a tender worth more than 1.7 million euros at REK Bitola, who got out of detention on a guarantee of more than 5 million euros, after which a court in Struga gave him his passport back. If the anti-corruption prosecutors really are going after their own colleagues, that's news. Whether it ends in a verdict is another question.

A login that both added and approved

A junior travel documents adviser in Skopje, according to internal control's criminal complaint, used her own login to add driving licence categories for people with no right to them, and then approved the applications herself. The scheme ran from the start of 2025 until 24 August 2026, six people have been charged, and one man with an illegally added category "A" rode a motorcycle across the state border. It's good that internal control uncovered the scheme. But how does the system let a single login both add and approve, with no second pair of eyes?

A customs seal in the driver's pocket

At the Dojran border crossing, the Customs Administration intercepted a truck carrying steel profiles, with a driver from Bosnia and Herzegovina, and 79 kilograms of marijuana meant for the Turkish market. The truck entered Macedonia with legal cargo; at a pre-arranged location, by agreement with people from Macedonia, the drugs were loaded inside, and the driver sealed the truck himself with a seal he'd brought along. Five people have been detained. This time the intelligence arrived before the truck. How many trucks get through when there's no tip-off?

Pensions are "stable", the fund is in the red

"Absolutely nobody needs to worry," Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski declared, and asked about a higher retirement age he replied "not for now, at least". The Fiscal Council, meanwhile, calculated that the pension fund deficit is 54.4 billion denars, or 5.2% of GDP, and proposes higher contributions and later retirement. The most important number came from the prime minister himself: 709,000 registered employees today, possibly under 500,000 in 15 to 20 years. Stability with a use-by date.

World Bank: 17 years standing still

According to the World Bank's new report, without reforms growth falls to 2.4% a year, and by 2050 Macedonia would reach only 55% of average EU income. We went from a lower- to an upper-middle-income country, then stood still for 17 years, while Albania, Serbia and Montenegro close the gap faster. Meanwhile eating and drinking out got 3.8% dearer in a year: alcoholic drinks 5.7%, food 4.7%. The statistics say price growth is slowing; the customer at the table sees something else.

Sofia: a meeting "by the water trough"

Timcho Mucunski and Bulgarian minister Velislava Petrova-Chamova are supposed to meet on Thursday in Sofia, on the sidelines of the Corridor 8 conference, but as of yesterday Bulgaria hadn't officially replied to Skopje's request. Mickoski dismissed the meeting in advance as a chat "by the water trough" - a quick word on the side - the opposition calls that undermining it, and Bulgarian President Yotova said there should be no ultimatums from the Macedonian side. If this is the first step towards unblocking, does anyone in either capital actually want that step to succeed?

Courtrooms and parties

In the "State Lottery" case, with damage of 9.7 million euros, Grubi will defend himself as a free man from 13 October, and to get his passport back he's offering property worth 335,707 euros. Stafa, convicted under a plea deal, now claims in court that the money wasn't for Ristov and that the deal was "the lesser evil", while the prosecution says it has electronic evidence. Both versions can't be true at the same time. In SDSM, Bitiqi is considering a return as vice-president after Filipche's offer, but answers him in public with a lesson in the culture of speech.

When citizens do the job

Six months of smoke from the "Krasta" landfill, and firefighting machinery promised by 2 October that never arrived. So residents of Pchinja and Studena Bara shut the landfill down themselves, and the trucks carrying Kumanovo's rubbish are now being turned back. In Skopje, "Lajka" caught 172 stray dogs in September - 44 were adopted, and 105 ended up right where they started, on the street. In Bitola, the draft of the new spatial plan promises Nidzhe as a national park and a Bitola-Ohrid expressway, while since 2020 the country has been planned according to an expired document.

The region and the world

Drones sank a merchant ship off the Bulgarian coast, and rescuers found only capsized life rafts. According to available information, it's the first attack of its kind in the economic zone of a NATO member - right next door to Macedonia. Kosovo got a president at the last minute: Justina Shiroka Pula passed with 81 votes, just one more than needed. In France, teenagers brought more than 250,000 people onto the streets, and Macron is only now calling a crisis meeting.

Sport

MZT returned to Europe after 25 years and lost 59:64, and the visitors from Thessaloniki complained not about the basket but about a banner in the stands. The national team brought home another 0:3 from Lucerne and is counting 787 minutes without a goal - a run that will last a full year by November.

The harder part of the day revolves around trust. Institutions caught their own people, which is good, while citizens were asked to take things on faith - on pensions, on Sofia, on a plan that expired six years ago. Trust is built with verdicts and numbers, not statements.