The mayor of Ohrid Municipality Kiril Pecakov called on the institutions to postpone the operation of the Podmolje - Ohrid section until the end of September, i.e. after the end of the tourist season. The Ministry of Transport and Communications reacts to the mayor's demands, calling them hypocritical and unacceptable.

By closing the entrance to the largest tourist center in the country and diverting traffic along the old road, large lines of vehicles and impatience among drivers are created, which will also affect the tourist season.

Petsakov pointed out that although they had a meeting with a contractor, investor and SVR Ohrid, at which the Municipality and the police were of the same opinion that closing the main entrance to Ohrid and diverting along the old road, which does not have the capacity to receive such a large number of vehicles, will create huge crowds and traffic problems, especially in the summer period, however, the decision was not respected.

"When they do not respect the decisions of the meeting, I publicly call on the ministers for transport and communications and for internal affairs and the prime minister, I ask all work activities around the entrance to Ohrid to be realized after the end of the tourist season, i.e. after September 15," he said. Petsakov

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In addition to the citizens, he emphasized that today there were reactions from tourism workers, whose guests from the flights from Amsterdam and Karlovica yesterday needed an hour and a half to get from the Ohrid airport to the hotels, the same time it took them to get to the country .

"The deadline for construction is 45 days, but the promises are that they will work in two shifts and in 30 days that the construction activities will be completed, but looking at the dynamics in these 7-8 years of working on the road, those 30-40 days easily there will be many more. It will cover the entire tourist season, and thus the chaos in the traffic, that is, in the access of tourists and citizens to Ohrid will be catastrophic, notes Petsakov.

According to him, if the construction activities take place after the end of the tourist season, the burden of the crowds entering and exiting Ohrid will remain on the people of Ohrid, who will be more tolerant in terms of tourism suffering.

In response to the request of the Ohrid mayor, the Ministry of Transport and Communications announced that the Government's support for the Municipality of Ohrid is unprecedented and assessed that his requests are "hypocritical and unacceptable".

"The support from the central government to the municipality of Ohrid is huge, as never before, and the reactions of the mayor of the municipality are hypocritical and unacceptable, especially when it comes to the same mayor who constantly calls for the acceleration of construction works on the same highway. The highway section from Kichevo to Ohrid is being built with the necessary dynamics and we will not allow anyone's obstruction to block the realization of this project", the written reaction of the Ministry states.

They note that, according to the announcement, the incomprehensible reaction came from a mayor from the political party, which left chaos on the same highway and now they are fighting to prevent that highway from being built.

"Petsakov should take into account that all the problems in this section that we found since the time when VMRO-DPMNE led the government have been removed. Thanks to the efforts and approach of this Government, the biggest problems were solved and over 3500 property-legal obstacles between the state and the citizens were solved. The interchanges were also designed, the slopes were redesigned, so today there is progress on the ground", the Ministry of Transport and Communications points out.

The Automotive Union of Macedonia announced that due to the reconstruction of the roadway, the traffic on the road direction Podmolje - Ohrid on the A3 main road has been diverted through the regional road R-1208 since yesterday.