The government has bragged about a big number: over 21 million euros invested in sports infrastructure in two years, across more than 60 projects nationwide. Investments in halls, athletics tracks, playgrounds and pools - and a message that sport is once again among the national priorities.

According to a statement from the ruling VMRO-DPMNE, the completed or started projects include the reconstruction of the „Rasadnik" sports hall, the athletics tracks in Veles and Gevgelija, the sports hall in Radoviš, the UKIM hall, new halls in Aerodrom, Kruševo and the Military Academy, as well as new stands at the City Stadium in Tetovo. MP Katerina Dimitrovska stressed that „the problem was never the money, but the priorities."

The number really does sound good - but it's worth looking at what sits behind it. The statement is a party statement, not an independent report, and the phrase „completed or started" leaves room: how many of those 60 projects are actually finished and working, and how many are still building sites or just announcements? When investments are summed up into one snappy figure in front of the cameras, the picture often looks more impressive than the situation on the ground.

Sports infrastructure genuinely is needed - children and young people deserve modern conditions, and no sane person will object to new halls and playgrounds. But the difference between invested and finished, between a cut ribbon and a working facility, is exactly where the PR parts ways with reality. The real indicator won't be in the statement, but in whether, a few years from now, those halls are running, being maintained and full of kids - or whether they become one more reminder that here it's easiest to build and hardest to maintain.