Nikola Gruevski

Gruevski's paternal grandparents came from the Ottoman Macedonia village of Krušoradi, where his grandfather Nikolaos Grouios (Nikola Gruev) (1911–1940) was born.

Until the official Greek annexation after the Second Balkan War in 1913, it was under the jurisdiction of the Bulgarian Exarchate.

The Greek administration later practised an assimilative anti-Bulgarian campaign, changing the names of local villagers to the corresponding Greek names.

The village itself was renamed by the Greek authorities to Achlada in 1926.

Gruevski's grandfather fought in the Greco-Italian War, where he lost his life.

His name is mentioned on the war memorial in Achlada among the names of the locals who were killed during World War II.

Years later, during the Greek Civil War, Gruevski's grandmother and father fled north to what was then Yugoslav Macedonia, where they changed their family name to Gruevski in order to gain citizenship through assimilation, as was the Yugoslav policy at the time.

His mother Nadežda is from Štip.

She is a sister of the first Minister of the Interior of the Republic of Macedonia - Jordan Mijalkov.

During the administration of Nikola Gruevski, his first cousin, Sašo Mijalkov was the director of the Administration for Security and Counterintelligence of the Republic of Macedonia.

Nikola Gruevski (Никола Груевски, pronounced ; born 31 August 1970) is a former Macedonian politician who served as Prime Minister of Macedonia from 2006 until his resignation, which was caused by the 2016 Macedonian protests, and led the VMRO-DPMNE party from 2004 to 2017.

Born in Skopje in 1970, Gruevski was brought up in a family that was neither privileged nor poor.

His father worked in furniture and design and his mother was a nurse.

After his parents' divorce, he was raised by his mother.

At the age of four, however, she went to work in Libya, like thousands of other Yugoslav citizens, and took him with her.

After their return, he completed primary and secondary education in Skopje.

In the election Gruevski earned the distinction of becoming the first elected European head of government born in the 1970s.

Having graduated from the Faculty of Economics at the St. Clement of Ohrid University in Bitola in 1994 (where he dabbled in amateur theatre and boxing) he entered the nascent finance sector, and was the first person to trade on Skopje's stock exchange.

During 1995 he worked as director of department in Multigroup owned Balkanbank, and became its exhibitioner till 1998.

In 1996 he also acquired qualifications for the international capital market from a London Securities Institute.

He founded the Brokerage Association of Macedonia in 1998 and made the first transaction on the Macedonian Stock Exchange.

After VMRO-DPMNE was defeated in the 2002 parliamentary election, there was a period of infighting within the party.

Gruevski emerged as the pro-EU leader, and he was elected as leader of the party after Ljubčo Georgievski left the position.

Ljubčo Georgievski after he left VMRO-DPMNE he set up his own party (VMRO-People's Party), but VMRO-DPMNE retained most of the party's supporters.

On 12 December 2006, he obtained a master's degree from the Faculty of Economics at the Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje.

The VMRO-DPMNE won the July 2006 parliamentary election, and on 25 August 2006 he constituted the new government.

His government had many new faces, mostly in their 30s, in key ministries and other positions.

He divorced his first wife and was married again in May 2007 to Borkica Gruevska with whom he has two daughters: Anastasija and Sofija.

Under the Pržino Agreement mediated by the European Union, Gruevski agreed to resign and left his post on 18 January 2016.

He has opposed treaties with Bulgaria in 2017 and the Prespa agreement signed with Greece in 2018.

In April 2022, he was added to the US Treasury's Specially Designated Nationals List of individuals facing Balkans-related sanctions and the US Department of State's corruption related sanctions.

Also in April, he was sentenced in Skopje to 7 years in prison on charges of money laundering and illegal acquisition and concealment of state property.

In May 2018 he was sentenced to two years in prison on corruption charges.

In November 2018 he was ordered to serve his sentence but failed to check-in with authorities and instead fled to Hungary, where he sought and was granted political asylum.

He has been accused of promoting the controversial identity politics called antiquization.

Under his leadership the country which had pro-European and pro-NATO policy, has changed sides to pro-Russian, pro-Serbian and anti-Western one.

Moreover, Gruevski also released a book in 2018 called "Experiences for the Future: Economic Effects of Different Types of International Capital Flows, With Particular Reference to the Republic of Macedonia"

The government under Ljubčo Georgievski sold the Macedonian Telecom to Hungarian Matáv and the OKTA oil refinery to Hellenic Petroleum.

Gruevski also implemented financial reforms, including the reform of the payment system and the value added tax of 18%, requiring fiscal receipts for all Macedonian businesses, which was a program designed to fight tax evasion.

Gruevski is the leader of the nationalist ruling party VMRO-DPMNE.