- Македонски
- English
On January 28, at 5 p.m. SSM is organizing a PROTEST that it is planned to start from SSM’s premisses in Skopje - SSM Workers' Home and then to continue towards the national Parliament, the Chamber of Commerce, finishing in front of the Government.
At today's session held on January 21, 2026, both the Council and the Presidency of the Federation of Trade Unions of Macedonia (SSM) in an expanded composition, with the participation of huge number of trade union activists, made an unanimous decision - on January 28, Wednesday, starting at 5 p.m., SSM together with the Macedonian workers’ will take the streets and will protest for higher wages.
It is time to fight for decent wages together with the workers’ and for this purpose we call on all the workers’ whose wages weren’t increased, we call on all the workers who are wondering and worrying about how to make ends meet at the end of every month, we call on all the workers who were lied to by their bosses and managers, directors, officials, prime ministers, ministers, etc. that they would increase their wages, but at the end did nothing, we call on all the above workers’ to join us in this fight.
By 31.12.2025, the Government did not agree to increase workers' wages and improve the life standards of the workers’ despite SSM’s efforts, but instead they mockingly indicated to the workers’ and their representatives that they need to sit down with the bosses and agree on a wage increase without direct involvement of the Government, which is an impossible mission to start with.
That’s why we call on the workers and we believe that they have many reasons to protest – we call for protest because the poverty line in Macedonia is 31,200 denars, and 33% of the 540 thousand workers’ live with a salary below the poverty line or we can conclude that they go to work, give all their skills and knowledge, but are still poor and only because those who do not want to agree with the trade unions to increase workers' salaries believe that the workers should be kept in poverty and hostage in order to be obedient, submissive with the sole purpose for them be easily manipulated by the ones who hold power making them blindly support their policy.
We call on the workers’ because now is the chance to show everyone that it is not only a few who need wage increase, but most of the workers’ ask for higher wages and noticeable increase. The planned increase of the salaries by 25 euros, as officials have been boasting for four months saying that they will align workers' salaries, starting with the salary in March when it is planned an increase of 25 euros, represents an increase that is not even slightly enough for the workers’. They believe that we should simply wait for the 25 euros increase… and instead being loud about this injustice we should keep quiet and hide. On other side the officials who keep talking about the up-coming wage increase of 25 euros, will receive increase between 200 and 300 euros, if we take into account that an official's salary starts from 90.000 denars to 180.000 denars. That’s why it is clear that they simply don't care about any worker and we want to share this message with you our comrades – workers – please understand that they only care about themselves and their 78% increased salaries together with the up-coming additional 10% increase from the salary for the month of February. They only care about you going out to vote to round up and give them such luxury, and because you do so and give their votes to them, at the end they do absolutely nothing for you.
Let’s remind ourselves that in 2025, SSM was the only trade union that was on the streets protesting for a wage increase. And even today, starting this new year with protests, we are asking for the support of every single worker, every single person who believes that they should not sit at home comfortably in their warm armchair. We ask that every worker join us on January 28 at 5 p.m. because by staying home, they are supporting the policy of low wages, miserable incomes, and a difficult life for all workers and their families.
Because if you stay quiet, the ones on power think that you are supporting them, they think that you do not need an increase in your salary, they think that there is no need for them to make decisions in the interests of 540 thousand workers versus 1.080 elected and appointed officials or versus their own interests.
It is time for workers’ to realize that only together we can fight for workers' rights, it is time for workers’ to realize that only together we can fight for workers' wages, it is time for workers’ to realize that they are left alone and that one worker acting alone cannot change much, but together we can change everything.
Let us once again use the opportunity that the media gives us to ask for the support of all workers’ and to call them to take active part in the protests, let us ask every worker to come and join us because only in this way we will point out to the bosses, but also to the elected and appointed officials that life is not good in Macedonia, because we have the lowest minimum wage, because we have the lowest average wage, because 200,000 thousand workers’ work, but are still poor and receive a salary below 30,000 denars, because the salaries of our colleagues in the region where the governments are taking care of them and are having active policy in direction to help the workers’, are increased, resulting with having a situation where in most of the countries, workers’ salaries having been significantly increased since the beginning of this year, or since the month of January.
It is time for us to stop begging anyone for an increase in our salaries, we have earned our salaries, we deserve them and we strongly believe that they need to be increased.
Most of the citizens and workers’ also spoke to SSM through the survey we conducted where they clearly said that they support the next steps we will take, and this is just the first step in a series of steps we plan to take in the coming period. Those steps will mean additional protests, additional blockades, a general strike in the public sector and the private sector, and if the ones on power do not listen to the loud voice of the workers’, then we will collect 10.000 signatures for them and we will become an authorized proposer of laws, where we will demand a reduction of the salaries of the officials - elected and appointed by 78% and we will demand an increase in the workers' salaries by at least 600 euros minimum wage and the increase in all other salaries of all the workers’ by at least 100 euros. With that we will show that the workers’ in the country have strength to fight, we will show that the workers’ in Macedonia have power, and that the power is in their unity expressed through the revolt and protests in the coming period on the streets because we only have the power of numbers, and they…they have the power of political parties or political power, and of course the bosses have the power of capital.
When asked where the protest will start and how it will be organized, SSM President Slobodan Trendafilov stated that:
"The protest starts as always in front of the Workers' Home or SSM’s building, then we will go and express our revolt before the Macedonian Parliament before the members from all political parties who have been keeping the proposal for wage increase of the Federation of Trade Unions of Macedonia (SSM) in a drawer for more than a year, and we as the biggest trade union in the country are the biggest witness that without having active social dialogue, laws related to workers' rights were changed on a fast track in the same Parliament with European flag and fast procedure. Therefore and because we have seen such practice now we will demand that they do the same when it comes to the increase in workers' salaries by increasing the minimum wage and increasing all the other salaries immediately, and this is the only message we have for them. Then we continue in front of the Chamber of Commerce, or we will protest in front of the bosses who in the past 36 years evicted members of our families, we will show our revolt in front of those who are the biggest culprits for the fact that entire families are leaving Macedonia, we will tell them that enough is enough and that what they are doing to the workers’ with making them work with small salaries and without respect of their workers’ rights, just so they can drive one more jeep and have one more apartment and one more villa is no longer humane and acceptable for Macedonian people. Of course we will end the protest in front of the Government which decided to not do anything for the workers’ for a period longer than year and a half, a Government that told the workers’ to sit down and reach an agreement with the bosses as it was something simple, and then they will support such an agreement without taking active part in the social dialogue. The same government that has been attacking the workers’ for the past year just, so that it can convince them that they don’t need an increase of their wages, the same government that decided to not help the workers’ by increasing the minimum wage and all the rest wages, the same government that leads the poorest workers’ in Europe and the poorest country in Europe, as the Prime Minister said when describing the situation in the country”.
The workers’ will express their revolt in this way because in our families we all have someone who has gone abroad to earn a crust of bread. Unfortunately all the governments we had so far have been playing with the workers' efforts and the workers' fate for more than 36 years, and all the bosses protected by them are doing the same. This year we have not seen a drastic increase in workers' salaries, when only in January the value of the trade union minimum basket increased significantly, making every family poorer by a thousand denars, with a trend this amount to increase even more in the following months.
“Therefore, the workers’, as we always do, will express their revolt from the Workers' Home at 5 pm on Wednesday the 28th and we will continue the protest in front of the Parliament, in front of the Chamber of Commerce, or in front of the employers and employers' organization, and we will finish the protest in front of the Government.” Explained Trendafilov
When asked what's next, that is, what will happen after the protest on Wednesday, President Trendafilov said:
"On Wednesday we are taking the streets to express workers' dissatisfaction, and then in the period that follows we are continuing with targeted blockades of certain institutions, at certain locations so that they feel the same way as we do, cause as we said they have been blocking us for a whole year, now we will block them too. After that we are continuing with a general strike in the entire public and private sector and in Macedonia, as the other unions usually like to tell us, we SSM will call on all workers’ to join us in a 24-hour general strike, where everyone will be protected from dismissal, everyone will have the opportunity not to work that day, everyone will have the opportunity to be on the streets that day, and of course everyone will choose for themselves whether to protest and take part in the general strike or not."
And to the question, that there is time until Wednesday (28th January) and what if the unions are called to a meeting and conversation with representatives from the Government, Trendafilov replied that:
"We are sure that today they can increase the minimum wage to 600 euros, also increase all other workers' salaries by the amount that will come from the difference from the increase in the minimum wage and they can do it today with one decision, but… they will not do it until Wednesday nor will they call us to a meeting, and if someone thinks that we should just sit and talk, I want to remind them that we have been doing that all last year, and when the Government sits down at the table they just come to tell us that the unions need to reach an agreement with the employers and that this is the only acceptable solution. As long as they do not increase the workers' salaries and as long as we hear only promises and only "will happen" because let’s remember that another Government in the past as well shouted "will happen" and nothing really did, and the current Government is just continuing their steps, then of course that the workers will be dissatisfied and will protest”.
Even today, and according to already signed active collective agreements, most of the employees in education for example have not received a salary according to the collective agreements, even today, employees in culture as well receive a salary lower than the established amount by the branch collective agreements or the general collective agreement for the public sector, even today you have employees in entire institutions such as the Macedonian Post Office where 90% of the employees are earning just the minimum wage, same example we have for the workers’ that work in the Macedonian Forests and a number of other institutions. A huge number of workers’ are affected and the workers’ cannot live on promises anymore, they cannot fill their refrigerators with promises, they cannot pay their bills with promises. As example the electricity bill for January, because of the holidays and people celebrating at their homes, will probably and for everyone be half of the amount of the minimum wage, which is a very scary situation where workers’ and their families will have to suffer. That is why politicians and bosses should have sat down until 31.12.2025 and agree to increase the minimum wage, but no… what they did is only mocking the workers' suffering.
Will we definitely be the last in the region, of course considering that many countries have already announced increases starting from the beginning of the new year?... We can only say that with such Government and with such employers, we are not only at the bottom, but we have broken through the bottom and we are free to say that SSM have been indicating this to the Government and employers all through 2025, but they did not believe us that it can happen us to be last in the region. On January 1st, 2026 everywhere in our region not only the minimum wage, but also all other wages have increased. Going only 50 kilometers from Skopje, workers’ from Macedonia can choose to work for a higher minimum wage, we can see the same situation in every part of our country, 50 kilometers from Gevgelija, also from Ohrid, also from Delchevo. What employers and elected and appointed officials do not understand is that only last year 11.500 workers’ legally left Macedonia to work in Croatia, and three or four times more than that number have left to work illegally in just one of the countries coming from our region. We want to replace domestic workers’ with foreigners and that is why the Government have increased the allowed quota to 10.000, but we following the situation have indicated the same to the previous Government and to this one as well - The Government has turned our country into a large travel agency for foreign migrant workers’, and even the President of the Chamber of Commerce said that they don't need workers’ coming from abroad, but that domestic workers’ should fill the empty jobs, and that with this policy we will drive out of the country even those small numbers of skilled workers’ who remained in Macedonia and decided to stay and work here.
We do not know whose goal and whose intention is to drive Macedonian workers out of Macedonia, but with keeping this policy we believe that they will not drive out only the workers’, but will drive out entire families to go abroad to work and build some foreign economy and not the domestic one.
If someone thinks that 397 euros minimum wage that will be adjusted with 25 euros or 1.500 denars increase according to the existing legislation in March (not in January) is enough to lift people out of poverty to help working families afford a slightly more dignified life, you are trampling on their dignity.
I think that the Government and employers today have the opportunity to restore a crumb of workers’ dignity, to restore a crumb of hope in the eyes of the workers’ and if they do not do that, of course, the revolt will be directed at them, and the workers’ for sure can’t be blamed for anything that will happen in the coming period, they are not to blame for the next protests nor for the next strikes and blockades. The only ones to blame are the Government and the employers who behaved and continue to behaving like despots towards the workers’.
