by Risto Stefovrstefov@hotmail.com
For over two thousand years Macedonia has been overrun, ransacked, and conquered by many invaders but never with such ferocity as that of the last 150 years. The violence has not only fractured the country but it has left the Macedonian population permanently in limbo.
In this document I intend to expose Greek and Bulgarian acts aimed at bringing division and conflict among the Macedonian people.
I will begin by recounting an example of my own experience.
For years (in Toronto, Canada) I worked with a man who had a complicated name which was difficult to pronounce. My co-workers called him "George the Greek". For a long time I avoided contact with George believing that it was better to avoid him than to be confronted by him. I am proud of my Macedonian identity and at the same time I am well aware of what Greeks think of it. I believed that if George found out that I was Macedonian he would challenge my identity in public, in the most demeaning manner, and I would have to defend it with equal ferocity.
That, I couldn't do, my co-workers would never understand let alone appreciate my less than gentlemanly manner. What would I say to someone who insisted on telling me "you are Greek" and that "there is no such thing as a Macedonian"? And if I continued to argue with him, he would ask me (in front of everyone) to show my passport or produce a map and show my country of origin on it. How would I respond to that? What would my non-Macedonian co-workers know or care about my argument with a Greek?
One day the inevitable happened. I was in a meeting with a dozen colleagues, when to my surprise George sat next to me. He looked at my notes and saw my name. Then without much hesitation and in a predictable manner, he uttered the words I despised most. "Are you Greek?" he asked me. Silence filled the room, as I replied, "No I am not". Then in a low quiet voice he again asked, "What are you then?" The silence was overwhelming and I felt trapped feeling my anger rising. I paused for a second then answered, " I am Macedonian". There was a long pause before George came back with the reply "I am also Macedonian". Baffled and surprised by his response, without thinking, I asked him, "Are you a real Macedonian or a Greek-Macedonian"? A "real Macedonian," he replied. A roar of laughter erupted around the room as I tried to regain my composure.
I got to know George not only as a fellow Macedonian, but also as a friend with whom I shared a close origin. I found that George was a typical Macedonian who learned about his past from his family. He was easy going, avoided politics and didn't mind his co-workers calling him Greek.
After that episode I thought a lot about what had happened. I also found out that I was not the only one with such strong feelings. How could I have mistaken George (a Macedonian) for a Greek? And, why did I harbor such strong feelings towards the Greeks?
Looking for answers took me back to the mid-1850s to when Macedonia was nearing half a millennium of Ottoman occupation. By this time most Macedonians lost ownership of their lands and became servants to the Turkish Chiflicks (estates). The Chiflicks were owned by Turkish settlers and protected by Turkish police and by the Turkish Army based in Macedonia.
After two prior failed attempts to liberate themselves, Macedonians shielded by the Ottoman occupation, lived in isolation having little to do with the Ottomans or other outsiders. There were no schools or education for Macedonian children and (almost) all of the population was illiterate. The only awareness of the outside world came from Greek clergy, travelers or migrating workers (pechalbari). The established Greek Patriarch Church showed little to no interest in the welfare of the Macedonians.
After Bulgaria achieved independence however, people began to once again believe that it was possible to liberate Macedonia from the Ottoman grasp. The notion of a free Macedonia did not go unnoticed by the Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian expansionist governments, which began to show interest in Macedonian affairs. Greek factions were already laying claim to Macedonia through the Greek Patriarch Church. It was through the influence of the Bulgarian Exarchist Church however, that encouragement for liberation was being promoted.
"Two Nations one People" was the Bulgarian motto echoed in propaganda campaigns throughout Macedonia. The Bulgarians believed in an independent Macedonia but under Bulgarian control. They refused to recognize the Macedonian people as a separate entity. Most Macedonians did not agree with that ideology and believed in the motto "Macedonia for the Macedonians".
Some however, believed in the safety of numbers and felt it would be better if they fought alongside the Bulgarians ("Christian Brothers") than to take on the Turks alone. The arguing and infighting split the Macedonian people into two groups, the Macedonian central committee faction and the pro-Bulgarian Verhovist committee faction. They both took on the name Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO) and began to arm for revolt. The IMRO-Central was formed in Solun by Macedonians. The IMRO-Verhovist was formed in Sofia Bulgaria with help from the Bulgarian Government and the Bulgarian King and took orders directly from the Bulgarian Verhovist Committee.
The Bulgarian involvement prompted Greece and later Serbia to take up similar actions and they also stepped up activities and propaganda inside Macedonia. In addition to church services all respective churches began to offer free education for Macedonian children. Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian schools were opened in most villages each offering education in its respective language. No one offered education in the Macedonian language. In fact all sides took extreme measures to avoid the Macedonian language.
All sides published their own version of statistics showing various proportions of nationalities living in Macedonia. None of them showed Macedonians living Macedonia. Competition to match statistics with student enrolment intensified as all sides were vying for the same children. As rivalry between factions escalated and agents failed to increase the numbers by propaganda alone, they began to use intimidation and scare tactics. Where intimidation failed violence took over. To meet their objectives, Greek, Bulgarian, and Serbian agents, sponsored by their respective churches, began to enlist the services of the disgruntled and criminal elements of society.
Threats of violence and intimidation polarized the Macedonian people and forced them to join pro-Greek, pro-Bulgarian or pro-Serbian alliances for protection. Extreme elements on all sides exerted influence by intimidation, blackmail and even murder. Priests were murdered for defecting from one church to another, children were beaten for switching schools and families were frowned upon for supporting or opposing one faction or another. Although Macedonians were rarely accused of murder, they were often accused of collaborating with the murderers.
Greek, Bulgarian, and Serbian agents, gangs, bounty hunters and hoodlums were paid by high ranking church officials to roam the Macedonian villages burning houses, intimidating people and committing crimes, all of this under the noses of the Turkish authorities. And when the authorities decided to take action, it was usually against the victims.
The situation for Macedonians worsened after the unsuccessful Ilinden rebellion against the Turks in 1903. The rebellion was poorly organized and prematurely executed. Some groups of the IMRO-Central were fooled into believing that once the rebellion was initiated, the Bulgarian army would march in to the rescue. Other IMRO groups did not trust the Bulgarians and felt the Macedonian people were not yet ready for a revolt. Finally when the order was given, only the Bitola and Kostur regions initiated revolt, the rest abstained.
Short sightedness and external meddling from the Bulgarians cost Macedonia her liberation and brought death and destruction to her people. The Turkish army crushed the rebellion in days and in retribution, burned many villages to the ground. To make matters worse, Greek armed bands (Andary) roaming the Macedonian countryside committed crimes and blamed them on the Macedonian revolutionaries (komiti) thus causing further misdeeds against the Macedonian people.
Under the guise of "educating the Christian children " and in the name of progress Greece, Bulgaria, and Serbia committed acts of violence against the Macedonian people. Between 1850 and 1913 Greek, Bulgarian, and Serbian interference in Macedonian affairs robbed Macedonians of their nationhood and brought about irreparable divisions among the Macedonian people. These acts of violence also inspired division, hatred, mistrust and hard feelings between the people of Macedonia and the people of Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia.
After Macedonia's partition (1913) all known Bulgarian sympathizers, including the pro-Bulgarian komiti, were expatriated (from Greek occupied Macedonia, Serbia had no influence in that region). Greek officials, accompanied by military and police support, went from community to community ordering people to take the dreaded oath of swearing loyalty to the Greek nation. Those who refused were told to "grab what you can carry and get out, this is Greece now and only Greeks live here". When they were finished, authority over Macedonia was handed over to the Greek police and the Greek military whose officers were all outsiders and foreigners to Macedonians.
The new masters turned out to be crueler than the old ones. They indiscriminately abused all Macedonians especially those who showed Macedonian nationalistic tendencies. Threats and intimidation became common practice. Over time and under extreme pressure some Macedonians were truly assimilated, willingly or out of fear, they pledged loyalty to the Greek nation. This new class of people became known as the Greek-Macedonians and laid claim to the ancient Macedonian heritage.
During the 1920's and 1930's a new form of division was instituted. The Greek Government implemented ethnic cleansing and Hellenization policies designed to erase the Macedonian character of both the people and their land. This time they targeted the heart of the Macedonian consciousness, the Macedonian language. Speaking Macedonian in Macedonia became illegal. If that wasn't enough, the Greek Government also instituted policies to erase all Macedonian names. Every first name, last name and place name in Macedonia was replaced with a Greek sounding name. Even gravestones with Macedonian inscriptions were defaced or destroyed.
Before their names were changed, Macedonians had a simple method of identifying each other. Each individual had a given name, family name and a community or village name. People didn't have last names like today. Their family name was usually derived from the given name of the eldest family member in the household. As families grew large and split up they assumed new family names. Everyone knew everyone else.
After the names were changed it became difficult for Macedonians to identity with each other. Some assumed last names that were different from others in their family. This did not only disconnect families from their roots, it created an identity crisis among Macedonians. They could no longer recognize each other by name alone or identify themselves from the Greeks. As a result people began to be suspicious of strangers. This explains why some Macedonians, including myself, continue to be suspicious of strangers with Greek sounding names.
Even though the situation improved somewhat for Macedonians during the occupation (1940-1945), many continued to be suspicious of strangers. Macedonians that fought side by side with the Greeks during the Partisan wars kept their nationality a secret. Many even refused to divulge their place of origin. They were suspicious of the Greeks and feared being shot in the back.
The Greek civil war was another dark chapter in Macedonia's history. It not only displaced most of the Macedonian population from its homeland, but more sinisterly it forced people to take up arms against each other where brother fought against brother and wife against husband, one in the name of Greece and the other in the name of Macedonia. To this day families have not reconciled the differences imposed upon them by this dreadful war.
After Greece capitulated to Nazi Germany at the start of World War II, the Greek army disbanded and left Macedonia. Remnants of the Greek police however, together with roaming armed bands (Andari) of the Greek paramilitary remained active and wreaked havoc. To counter this threat, the old revolutionary bands (komiti) from Turkish times were resurrected and armed with Italian help. After the rise of the Partisans most bands disbanded and surrendered their weapons to the Partisans. Some were isolated and later organized by Bulgarian agents to fight the Greek Andari and the Partisans on Bulgaria's behalf.
In the beginning all efforts by the Greeks to start a Greek Partisan movement in Macedonia, failed. Initially, the Greeks did not want Macedonian involvement. Failed attempts to gain support from the Macedonian people however, made them realize that they could not succeed alone. Permission was granted to Macedonian leaders to mobilize the Macedonian people.
When the Greeks saw a large battalion forming (in the Lerin, Kostur and Prespa Regions) beyond their expectations, they began to worry of a Macedonian uprising. Fearing they would lose control of Macedonia they ordered the battalion to move south to Ipiros. The Macedonian leaders refused, asserting that they mobilized the movement to protect Macedonia not some foreign land. The Greeks gave them an ultimatum, move or be prepared for a military response. They moved, but not to Ipiros as ordered but across the Yugoslav border where they joined other Macedonian forces in the fight to liberate today's Republic of Macedonia.
When the war was over, Yugoslav (Serbian) occupied Macedonia earned Republic status in the Yugoslav federation. The Macedonians in Greece meanwhile entered a new phase of warfare, the Greek civil war. It is interesting to note that up until now the Greeks wanted nothing to do with Macedonians. During this phase however, a new set of promises began to surface. As the Greek Partisans began to lose the war against the Royal forces, they began to enlist more and more Macedonians with promises of recognition as a separate nationality, equal rights and outright independence from Greece. With lies and empty promises the Greeks even tried to enlist the Macedonian Partisans they pushed out to Yugoslavia. Some, wanting to reunite with their families came back. Both sides (Greek Partisans and Greek Royalists) enlisted from the same population, pitting brother against brother in this insane war.
The failed Macedonian uprising against the Ottoman Empire (1903), the Balkan wars (1912-1913) and later the Greek civil war (1945-1949) displaced many Macedonians from their homeland.Most of the displaced population from the 1903 uprising and from the 1912-1913 Balkan wars fled to Bulgaria or immigrated to Canada, the USA and Australia.
Most of the displaced population from the Greek civil war, including the refugee children, fled to Eastern Block countries such as Yugoslavia, Romania, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and the Soviet Union. After the civil war, the majority, including children were not allowed to return home. So, after years of life in limbo away from home and loved ones, most immigrated to the Republic of Macedonia, Canada, the USA and Australia in an attempt to re-unite with their families and find a better life.
What they found is that Greek and Bulgarian torment was not confined to Macedonia. The Greek and Bulgarian campaigns of the late 1800's were alive and well in the Diaspora. Organizations such as the pro-Bulgarian "Macedonian Patriotic Organization" (MPO) and the pro-Greek Pan Macedonians were formed to attract and divide the growing Macedonian immigration. Macedonians that immigrated early (start of the 20th century) organized village associations to assist fellow immigrants adjust in their new countries. These village associations were now becoming a threat to Greek influence over the Macedonian population at home and in the Diaspora.
As the associations grew in strength so did their threat. With help from Greek Embassies and Consulates pro-Greek factions infiltrated some associations and rendered them mute. Many resisted and managed to preserve their unique Macedonian identity. For those that resisted the Greeks formed parallel pro-Greek associations. This way when the Macedonian association organized an event the pro-Greek association organized a similar event at the same time. Macedonians that could be influenced were discouraged from joining Macedonian organizations and were offered the Greek alternative.
While the pro-Greek organizations worked openly to divide Macedonians, the pro-Bulgarian MPO took a more covert approach. While its rhetoric openly promoted "Macedonian for the Macedonians" its constitution harboured pro-Bulgarian agendas.
Macedonians may have become a minority in Greece but they are strong in numbers in the Diaspora. In addition to village associations the Macedonian communities built churches, schools and formed cultural groups over the years. Organizations, such as the United Macedonians of Canada, with primary objectives to "unite all Macedonians", were formed and have grown in strength but have not totally eliminated Greek and Bulgarian influence. Financed by Greece many newspapers, publications, radio and television programs continuously bombard the people with Greek propaganda.
One hundred and fifty years ago there were no Greek-Macedonians, Bulgarian-Macedonians, Serbian-Macedonians, Albanian-Macedonians or Slav-Macedonians, there were only Macedonians. No matter what they call us we are still "Macedonians".
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