Henadz Fiadynich: Authorities have a month to pay wages in arrears

People will soon stop asking permission for protests and take to streets.

The meeting of the Electronics Trade Union urge the government to “provide real wages, pensions, scholarships and allowances not lower than those of December 2014 in dollar terms; pay wages in arrears at all plants and companies regardless of their type of ownership by May 29, 2015,” Belorusskaya Pravda writes.

Participants of the meeting also urge the government to cancel three discriminative ordinances: on short-term employment agreements, on unlimited power of employees and on social parasitism that violate the Constitution of Belarus.

How does the Electronics Trade Union plan to achieve the implementation of its demands? Trade union head Henadz Fiadynich answers this question.

– The draft resolution contains both economic and political demands to the government . Why?

– The demands to the government and the president were formed by the meeting of the Electronics Trade Union. It is only draft demands. We hope citizens of Belarus will support us. Of course, we didn't cover all problems that worry Belarusian society.

The trade union meeting approved the programme that contains the point “struggling for the democratisation of society”. District commissions at the presidential elections must count votes properly, not in the way they were ordered to “count”. The democratisation of society seems impossible without an honest procedure of vote counting. Both trade union members and society think that representatives of opposition parties, movements and independent trade unions must be included in all district election commissions ahead of the presidential “elections”. People should elect and believe that their future depends on their votes. No one believes today they their votes can influence something.

– The draft programme contains demands but lacks a mechanism for their implementation. How to you plan to fulfil the decisions of the meeting?

– When we get a feedback to our demands from society, an organising committee of representatives of civil society will be formed. The committee will present final demands that will be sent to the president administration, the government and the parliament. We give the Belarusian authorities one month to respond to the proposed demands.

I'd like to say that I leave open the possibility that our demands can be ignored. In this case the organising committee will decide how we should protect our rights.

– Do you have any variants?

– We have enough variants. People can meet with officials, hold pickets and try to organise rallies. Of course, we'll send our demands to a number of European embassies.

We doubt that the authorities will permit protests. If the authorities continue to ignore legal demands of Belarusians for rallies, including protests against a decline in living standards, people will soon stop asking permission of the authorities and take to streets. What will the authorities do in this case? Let them think about it.

– The Belarusian regime never tried to hear people. How long will the campaign initiated by the trade union continue?

– It's clear that it won't end in summer. The main phase of protecting our economic rights will be in autumn.

But people are not ready to wait. They want their wages in arrears to be paid. Plants should pay the owed wages by the end of May. The government, ministries, government bodies and directors can take any actions, but people should eat and live properly. People sell their work but receive fairy tales about a “rosy future” instead of wages.

– Is the campaign to protect economic and political rights supposed to give birth to a new nation-wide movement?

– This is one of the variants. If society reacts actively, if it adds new demands to the existing ones, also regional problems, I do not rule out that the campaign may turn into a nation-wide movement.

[12:24:26] катя нов: The text of the draft resolution adopted at the meeting of the Electronics Trade Union on April 18 is below:

– Dear colleagues, people of work and compatriots!

The Belarusian ruble has been devalued 24.4% since January 1, 2015. The President promised an average salary of $1000 in 2015, but today's average salary is only $400 and salaries of workers and clerks is $200-250.

Warehouses of almost all leading vehicle manufacturers are filled with products. The sum of unsold products is more than $2.62 billion.

Plants begin to work three and four days a week. Workers are made to take unpaid leave.

Prices of basic consumer goods, food, services and medicines were allowed to float freely.

Consumer buying power has sharply decreased. Workers, let alone pensioners, had to change their food habits and buy cheap low-calorie products.

The responsibility for the poverty of people and their families as well as for the deplorable state of the country's economy lies entirely on the president and the government.

It's time to protect our legal rights, well-being of our families and future of our children.

Our demands to the president, parliament and government:

– Provide real wages, pensions, scholarships and allowances not lower than those of December 2014 in the dollar terms.

– Pay wages in arrears at all plants and companies regardless of their type of ownership not later than May 29, 2015.

– Cancel Ordinance No.29 “On Additional Measures to Improve Labour Relations, Strengthen Labour and Performance Discipline” (on short-term employment contracts), Ordinance No.5 “On Strengthening the Requirements for Managers and Employees of Organisations” (on giving unlimited power to employers) and Ordinance No.3 “On preventing freeloading practices” (on social parasitism) as they violate the Constitution.

– Remove the post of a deputy director for ideology from all plants and companies regardless of their type of ownership as it violates article 4 of the Constitution.

– Release legal and regulatory acts and set punishment for employers to stop the practice of making employees take unpaid leave.

– Reduce a price of a square metre of housing to the level of the country's average salary, check the validity of a price of $1300-1600 per square meter of housing and write about it in the media.

– Introduce a declaratory principle of registration of new trade union organisations.