Macedonia and Kosovo After the Military Operations

 

by Antonina Zhelyazkova Translated from Bulgarian by Violeta Angelova  

I. Approaches to the research and methodology

II. Social specifications of the respondents
1. Albanian refugees in the camps and in the private houses in Tetovo
2. Albanians in Macedonia and Albanians in Albania. Their social relations with the Kosovars
3. The Macedonians

III. Psychological portraits of different ethnic and social levels
1. Albanian refugees in the camps and in the houses of Tetovo
2. Macedonians and Macedonian society as a whole

Conclusion

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III. Psychological portraits of different ethnic and social levels

2. Macedonians and Macedonian society as a whole
Macedonians are in a depressed state regardless of their educational and social status level. They are seized with the feeling of hopelessness and fear in two directions thus feeling themselves as if pressed in a vice. On the one hand, they are already in an economic crisis and are quite well aware of the perspective of a much deeper economic and social depression with all its shocks, i.e. unemployment, worsened health services, decline in the level of education and culture, growing criminality, strengthening of the mafiotic structures and corruption, fall of standard to unknown low levels, etc. On the other hand, they feel themselves threatened ethnically, nationally and civilizationally in some hypertrophic and unreal dimensions.  They are afraid of the Albanian demographic expansion in the Balkans and their expectations are that in a few years they will be half of the Macedonian population with the tendency to be more and more ousted. The language when talking about the Albanians, is diversified with military terms: “Bitolja fell”, Tetovo is Albanian”, Struga is conquered”, “Ohrid is still keeping its ground”, etc. Fear lies at the root of the myths for the adoption of the Kosovars in Macedonia, for buying houses, lands and their gradual settling as well as the unjustified fear that a great part of the refugees will remain in Macedonia.

The respondents reacted aggressively to our questions putting counter-questions: “Have you ever seen a Muslim with less than 5-8 children? And what about you, how many children have you got or have you any children at all?”; “How many Muslims are there in Bulgaria?”, “They will soon sweep over you as well”, “Do you have Albanians in your country?”, “Oh, the Turks are something else, one can live with them….”; “What shall we do?” – “All the orthodox people in the Balkans should unite in one state in order to withstand the Albanians and the Muslims…”, “It is maybe only a confederation with Bulgaria that could frighten these shipters…” Why did you give air passages to NATO but not to Russia?”, “Macedonia will be small for them, they’ll come to Bulgaria too”.  This fear, verging on neurosis explains the fact that not one Macedonian family invited refugees at their home and the refugees caused a new escalation of the xenophobic feelings among the Macedonians.

It is surprising that they have lost the will to find the exit from this fear. The feeling of predestination separates the two big ethnic groups more and more. The Macedonians think that the Albanians are conservative, reticent, not admitting any external people, they consider themselves as self-sufficient and for this reason even scholars are not actively studying them. It is preliminary assumed that the close contact of ethnographers, anthropologists and sociologists will not lead to scientifically based results because even if the Albanians accept the interviewers, they will lie to them giving information imposed from on top. This proved to be absolutely false – the Albanians are open to contacts and they are willing to narrate about themselves, the traditions, the habits, the families, the prospects, their political views, etc.

5^th July, 1999
Sofia