Sunday April 8, 12:00 PMMacedonian youth caught between war and peace
SKOPJE, April 8 (AFP) - The image of US Secretary of State Colin Powell flickers across the black and white television screen but, at a time when the great powers are pondering the fate of Macedonia, Sasha in his small dormitory room dreams only of leaving the country.
The world of this Jean-Paul Sartre devotee is the City University of Skopje, a massive gray cement building with two 15-floor towers that bears the unmistakable hallmarks of Yugoslav communist architecture.
"There's no outlook for the future here," says Sasha, 24. "I'm going to finish my diploma in philosophy soon and I know that I won't be able to find work in this country because I don't belong to any political party.
"My only chance is to go abroad."
His views are shared by many of his fellow students at City University where, of 1,500 students, only 47 are ethnic Albanian. The rest are of Slav Macedonian stock.
They dream of going to London, New York, Montreal -- anywhere but here.
Macedonia, where images of recent clashes between ethnic Albanian rebels and government forces have been flashed around the world, has a population of more than two million people. A million of whom are under the age of 18.
Aside from the recent violence, the country's post-communist transition has been painful despite its promising beginnings when it became the only former Yugoslav republic to gain independence peacefully.
In particular, its economy has been hit hard by the region's military strife, the crisis in Kosovo -- which saw it flooded with ethnic Albanian refugees -- and economic embargoes imposed on its main economic partner, Yugoslavia.
The unemployment rate is at about 36 percent and the average monthly salary barely stretches to 150 dollars.
"The main problem among young people in Macedonia is over-politicisation, in which they bear the brunt of the social and economic situation," says noted Macedonian sociologist Emilia Simovska.
In the capital, where a steady stream of international heavyweights have turned up pledging support for the ethnically-mixed government, many young people think the worst may be over, but that uncertain times still lie ahead.
"I'm starting to lose patience because the government is spending too much time sorting out the problems which affect us," said Ivan, a 22-year-old journalist.
"Nobody wants to believe that 10 years after the fall of communism Macedonia can't get back on its feet economically," he added.
The opposition and government only think about one thing, getting money where they can," said one ethnic Albanian student.
In Sasha's room, where piles of independent newspapers are carefully folded, another student, Nikola, aged 22, says that "not a day passes that I don't think about the Albanian minority".
He said the "ethnic Albanians are ready to make war because they claim to be oppressed, but they have a better life in Macedonia than Albanians in Albania."
He also admits to the fear that he would be have been called up to fight in the recent conflict with ethnic Albanian rebels in the northern mountains and on the edges of the northwestern town of Tetovo.
"I am a patriot, but I refuse to die for any politicians," he said.Copyright © 2001 AFP
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