A new analysis of property records and party accounts shows North Macedonia’s ruling party far outstrips its rivals in real-estate holdings, owning more than half the political sector’s disclosed property portfolio. The centre-right VMRO DPMNE, led by Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski, holds 101 properties across the country with a book value of €25.2 million, according to Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) analysis of cadastre data and the parties’ 2024 financial reports.
By comparison, the Social Democrats — VMRO DPMNE’s traditional rival for power — reported ownership of 12 properties valued at €2.7 million, while the country’s largest ethnic-Albanian party in opposition, the Democratic Union for Integration (DUI), listed five properties worth €2 million. The figures, drawn from the most recent publicly filed accounts, highlight a substantial concentration of party property wealth in the hands of the governing formation.
The BIRN cadastre review mapped the locations and legal registrations of the assets, while the parties’ financial statements provided the valuations used in the comparison. On average, VMRO DPMNE’s portfolio is valued at roughly €249,500 per property; the Social Democrats’ holdings average about €225,000 each, and DUI’s smaller portfolio averages around €400,000 per property, underscoring that the opposition’s fewer assets can be of higher individual value.
The analysis does not specify how the properties are used, but political parties commonly employ real estate for headquarters, regional offices, party clubs, or as rental assets to support operations. Financial reports are intended to show sources of funding and asset holdings as part of transparency and accountability frameworks; the 2024 filings therefore provide the first consolidated picture in recent years of how physical assets are distributed among the country’s main political actors.
The scale of VMRO DPMNE’s declared holdings — both in number and total valuation — is likely to fuel debate about the role of material resources in party competitiveness and campaign capacity. Opposition parties and watchdogs have in the past raised concerns in many countries about disparities in resources between governing parties and challengers; the new dataset gives North Macedonian observers concrete figures to inform those discussions.
BIRN’s combined use of cadastre records and official party accounts offers a more detailed view than single-source reporting, though it is limited to properties that are registered and declared in the parties’ 2024 financial reports. The analysis does not address undisclosed assets, rental incomes, mortgages or how properties were acquired. Still, it provides a benchmark for further scrutiny of party finances and could prompt calls for deeper auditing or legislative review of political-finance transparency if domestic stakeholders press the issue.