North Macedonian passport - © justit/Shutterstock
With the Prespa Agreements of 2018, the then Republic of Macedonia agreed to change its constitutional name to North Macedonia. Now the new definition must be included in citizens' documents, a process however full of delays and obstacles
By February 12, 2024, all new identity cards, driver's licences and passports should read “Republic of North Macedonia”. The country's authorities claim that, according to the 2018 Prespa agreement with Greece (when the Republic of Macedonia became officially the Republic of North Macedonia), the personal documents should now also be changed.
On the other hand, journalistic research has shown that the whole process is not quite so rigorous, and that it will still be possible to use the old documents until they expire.
Citizens are requesting new documents out of fear that they will not be able to use them in banks, courts, institutions or if they are stopped by the traffic police. Interest in new ID cards began a few months ago, when Minister Oliver Spasovski announced that after February 12, 2024, old ID cards, driver's licences and passports will not be valid due to the Prespa Agreement.
The obligation to change personal documents with the new constitutional name arose from the Prespa Agreement, signed in June 2018, which entered into force in February 2019. According to Article 1, point 10 of the agreement, personal documents should be changed within five years after the entry into force of the agreement – that by February 2024.
Unfortunately, the Macedonian authorities failed to harmonise some of the laws related to the Prespa Agreement, like the ID card procedure, while the laws on passports and the driver's licences were successfully harmonised.
A confused process
“Personal documents that are for internal use, such as identity cards, will remain valid”, said Prime Minister Dimitar Kovacevski on January 12, adding that the option will be considered of extending the deadline for replacing passports.
The opposition VMRO-DPMNE announced that it will submit an initiative to the Constitutional Court related to the laws related to the change of personal documents.
Citizens started making appointments to take pictures and start the process of getting new documents, but some of them got dates in September or October 2024. The Ministry of the Interior tried to react and opened the possibility to apply for new documents without an appointment, but this created huge lines, especially in Skopje.
According to newspaper Sloboden Pechat, banks around the country will accept old identity cards until they expire as per the official position of the Macedonian Banking Association.
The State Election Commission told the newspaper that, according to the current provisions of the Electoral Code, all adult citizens with valid identity documents are included in the Voters' List in view of the upcoming elections of April 24 and May 8.
Minister Spasovski said that no one will be punished or fined if they do not have a personal document with the new name after February 12, 2024. On January 9, President Stevo Pendarovski publicly presented a proposal for extending the deadline for the new documents to September-October and he asked for the consent of Greece as well.
“Helping citizens”
Denko Maleski, professor of International Law and former Foreign minister, told Radio Free Europe that extending the deadline for personal documents is the least the state can do, given that "the change of documents does not go as fast as we hoped".
"In these 32 years, our country had to take many unpopular actions in order to survive and progress on the international stage. In a sense, the state is indebted to the people and should do literally everything to ease their situation as a result of the decisions it had to make”, Maleski told RFE/RL. “Politicians should find a way to make it easier for citizens to access documents”.
In addition to personal documents, citizens should put a sticker with the new mark NMK instead of the mark MK on their licence plates by February 12, 2024 at the latest.
Millions of documents already replaced
After filling out a request, citizens have to pay at the post office, bank or at the departments of the Ministry of the Interior.
Photographing follows, then waiting for 7 to 14 days to pick up the new documents. In addition to the separate photo session for each type of document, citizens need also to wait in line to take the new documents from the state offices.
Macedonians pay about 6 Euros for a new ID card, about 10 Euros for a driver's license and about 40 Euros for a new passport.
According to data from the Ministry of the Interior, from July 5, 2021 to the end of December 2023 1,007,885 identity cards, 1,169,463 passports and 529,799 driver's licences were changed.
