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"Lukashenka's Been Beaten All Along The Line"

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"Lukashenka's Been Beaten All Along The Line"

What do the residents of the region, where the salary is $50, say?

The other day, employees of the Shchedrynskaye agricultural enterprise in Zhlobin district of Homel region received payrolls with new salaries. People got $50-100 for hard work on the farm almost without weekends.

"My son came, holding the pay slip and crying: Mom, I can't do it anymore, I quit, I'm going to Russia. My son is 21 years old", - a farm worker told reporters.

What happens to salaries in the Belarusian regions and how does it affect the sentiments of people? Dzmitry Savich, activist of the European Belarus civil campaign from Svetlahorsk, answers the questions of Charter97.org.

How would you comment on the situation with salaries in the farm of Zhlobin district?

- The situation depends on the type of enterprises. For example, there are departmental farms that belong to Belarusnauta. They may have a better situation with both fuels and lubricants and with all the other necessary materials. But there are enterprises of municipal form of ownership. They do not receive as much support as the departmental ones.

There is also the seasonal factor. In winter, wages are lower, of course, and in summer they are higher. There is also the human factor: a lot depends on the manager and even the district.

On the whole, the situation in the economy is rather bad. Lukashenka has a problem with oil supplies, which has led to higher prices for energy resources and farms do not have enough money to buy the necessary materials: fuel and lubricants, repair and spare parts.

All enterprises are mired in loans, people have no motivation to work. By the way, the mechanizers from Shchedrynskaye said that if the enterprise had been private, everything would have been different. They said: "We have ordered all the necessary parts and materials, but only 20% of what we asked for has arrived".

Another important feature of the public sector in Belarus is that there are no equal conditions for business entities, collective farms and agricultural enterprises. It turns out that if you have profitable connections in the banking sector, you can get a loan and you will be afloat. But this applies mainly to privileged farms that are related personally to Lukashenka or his nomenclature.

As for us, the agricultural producers are not luxuriating in Svetlahorsk district. We cannot say that someone gets $500, there are no such people. Maybe the people in Shchedrynskaye called journalists themselves, because the situation had already gone too far. How to survive for 100 rubles? In general, the situation in most farms is the same as in Shchedrynskaye, but people simply stay silent for now. This is because there are leverage factors such as not renewing the contract. People are afraid that they won't be able to send their children to kindergarten or that they will be pressured through the children- students. This was the case in Svetlahorsk when people from the Executive Committee used to make "black lists".

In our country, almost all of us live like in Shchedrynskaye. Perhaps, a thousand hundred people all over Belarus live well in a European way, but the rest of us are only one remove from Shchedrynskaye.

- And to think that Lukashenka once came to power promising to "improve the life of rural workers"...

- He came in the mid-'90s, when everyone was expecting a lot worse. However, other post-Soviet countries started to revive the market gradually: the elite at all levels were renewed, new owners appeared. We'd better have this process of natural market development as well - in the end, there would be a completely different society.

Now the system is only focused on enrichment of a narrow group of people headed by Lukashenka. Yes, he promised a lot of things, but the expectations, to put it mildly, were not met. The way people live in Poland, for example, and the way they live here are two big differences. We have to start developing the economy through other mechanisms and to discover the creative potential of the people.

- What do people in Svetlahorsk and other regions say about their income and prospects of working in Belarus?

- During the "parliamentary" campaign, I, as a representative of European Belarus, used to hold pickets, offering to speak out to everyone who came. It was like an open people's microphone. Generally, the people were expressing their discontent with the authorities. Everybody sees that there is a clean, beautiful wrapper on the outside, but the "candy" itself is absolutely tasteless inside - like a piece of clay. People used to say that it is wrong that one person stays in power for so long, there should be alternation - then there will be higher growth of economy and living standards. We have potential, but it is not revealed, because the method of management is still Soviet, enterprises are under state control, the science and technology school is destroyed.

People expressed their opinion about Lukashenka in the following way: "You have had 25 years. Could you do anything smart? The result of your reign, Lukashenka, is the eating up of the leftovers of the Soviet Union heritage".

A couple of pensioners were even saying openly that this "family from Drazdy" should be taken away, that Belarus is for a long time, and that lukashenkas are temporary. Indeed, he's already worn out the welcome, all the terms are up. After all, it's a family that has sat down to power and taken hold in Minsk, and absolutely spits on everyone else.

There's not even a hint of any sort of compassion for Svetlahorsk either. Instead of solving the problem with the "stinking factory", he made a theatrical show: "How is that!? Well, I didn't know anything. I'll take care of it! Smell, stink, we'll fix everything." And what did he end up with? On February 14, he came, and he chose such a day so that people were feeling more kind and were buying gifts. I think that he would have come on March 8, too. He launched the plant, and Yury Nazarau was promoted: he was the chairman of Bellespaperpram, and now he is the vice-premier.

- By the way, about the whitewashed pulp plant in Svetlahorsk... How did the construction of the "stinking" plant affect people's attitude to the authorities?

- This plant is a very serious defeat of Lukashenka. Obviously, he has already had a lot of such fiasco: it's the Brest Battery Plant, Omsk Karbon in Mahiliou, Krychautsement, and the Dobrush plant. We can say that Lukashenka's been beaten all along the line.

He involved the Chinese in "modernizing" or constructing. In every place, it ended in a fiasco. These facilities didn't become what everyone expected. Such miscalculations, failures are a blow to Lukashenka's power.

- What, in your opinion, should be done for the Belarusian workers to stop crying over the pay slips after the "salary"? How can we change the situation in the country?

- Personally, I think that some kind of collective mind should be activated in people. Everyone should understand that it is necessary to change the situation if we want to live better. And we must not be afraid, it is very important.

One of the keys to solving this problem is mass rallies, involving 100,000 or 200,000 people. People must group together, unite. There must be a good information and propaganda campaign. Actually, this is what we, European Belarus, are doing. We talk to people, distribute materials, leaflets, write articles.

I think that first the political and economic system must be changed in Belarus - then people will start to live better.

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