Brest market traders: We stop working from March 1

Market traders don't see opportunities for working under new conditions.

Market sellers from Brest say they will not work from March 1. Representatives of small business hope the authorities will react to their move, Larysa Batsko, a member of the Council of Traders of TSUM Market, says. She emphasised that conditions for sole traders in the Customs Union were created only on paper and people lose their jobs in reality, Radio Racyja reports.

“We will stop working from March 1. It is not a strike. We just cannot continue our work. We don't have the right to sell the stocks. The documents we bring from Moscow are fake. The package of documents can be bought at a market for 500 rubles. They fill in these fake documents for additional 500 rubles. We cannot show such documents to controlling agencies,” she said.

Market traders plan to meet with representatives of the tax service and local authorities. Despite the inability to work, traders will hold meeting of small business representatives in March, which is not forbidden by law.

Sole traders in Mahilou said earlier they planned to hold a protest action on March 2.

The Forum of Small Businessmen, which was held in Minsk lately, failed to achieve the main aim – postponing the coming into force of Lukashenka's decree No.222 that obliges sellers to have accompanying documents for all items on sale. Trading without accompanying documents will be prohibited in a week. Traders will be fined 9 million rubles for violations and their goods will be confiscated. Controlling agencies begin to carry out checks on a large scale and confiscate goods.

Representatives of small business say market traders will have to stop working, because wholesale centres in Russia, where most of them buy goods, do not issue certificates.