“I AM still alive,” said Radmila Sekerinska in a shaken voice. “That is a cause for relief, considering the alternative.” The deputy head of Macedonia’s Social Democrats required stitches after being dragged by the hair on the evening of April 27th, when a mob supporting VMRO, the nationalist former ruling party, smashed into the country’s parliament.

Macedonia has been in a state of political crisis for more than two years, but the attack in Skopje may prove a turning point. For weeks VMRO had been filibustering efforts by the Social Democrats and their allies, an ethnic Albanian party, to elect a new speaker. On April 27th they at last managed to vote in Talat Xhaferi, an ethnic Albanian MP. Several hundred VMRO supporters, who had been demonstrating outside parliament, stormed the chamber and assaulted Social Democrats, ethnic Albanians and journalists. At least four deputies were hurt, one badly.

VMRO claimed that parliamentary rules had been violated. “The election of the speaker was clearly illegal,” said Vlatko Gjorcev, a VMRO deputy who was one of the few in his party who physically defended those under attack.

Macedonia’s problems stem in part from tensions with its ethnic Albanian minority, who make up a quarter of the population, but the main cause of this crisis is a corruption scandal. Nikola Gruevski, the leader of VMRO, served as prime minister for a decade beginning in 2006, in coalition with an ethnic Albanian party. In 2015 the Social Democrats began releasing leaked tapes of Mr Gruevski and other senior officials which appeared to implicate them in corruption, electoral fraud and interfering with the judiciary. Since then a special prosecutor has indicted Mr Gruevski and other VMRO officials.

Elections held last December gave VMRO a slight edge, but its Albanian partner refused to continue their coalition, instead throwing in its lot with the Social Democrats. On March 1st, Macedonia’s president refused to give them a mandate to form a government, saying their agreement to extend the use of Albanian as an official language would “destroy” the country. That led to a stalemate, daily protests by VMRO supporters, and ultimately to the assault of April 27th. If the president still refuses to let the Social Democrats form a government, says Ms Sekerinska, they are prepared to go forward without his mandate.

For the past few weeks rumours have gripped Macedonia suggesting that the president was about to declare a state of emergency. Many fear that could entail mass arrests, perhaps including that of Zoran Zaev, the leader of the Social Democrats. Earlier this month 22 “patriotic associations” formed a Macedonian National Front to support VMRO, pledging to use “all available non-violent or violent means to defend the fatherland”. Ominously, during the attack on parliament, emergency barriers to hold out intruders were not activated; some of the police protecting parliament, who are under the control of an official appointed by VMRO, fraternised with the mob.

Ana Petruseva, a reporter with the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, said she thought the violence was “clearly organised by VMRO”. Florian Bieber, a Balkans expert at Graz University, says he believes that if the party loses power, much of its leadership will end up in jail. Mr Gruevski, he said, had embarked upon an authoritarian course, much like several other leaders in the region. He sees Macedonia as a “prototype”, one “much further down the road than the others”.

What happens now will depend in part on external actors. Both the European Union and America have made statements supporting the election of the new speaker, and hence the end of VMRO rule. Russia has supported VMRO throughout the crisis, claiming that Western countries want to create a Greater Albania which would destroy Macedonia. The question is whether the EU and the Americans will back up their words by isolating or imposing sanctions on Mr Gruevski and his party. “We need reconciliation,” says Mr Gjorcev. Many others in VMRO would prefer to cling to power.