OVER 150,000 ENTREPRENEURS ON STRIKE IN BELARUS :: Charter'97 :: News

Over 150thsd businessmen engaged in the national warning strike of individual entrepreneurs, which took place on July 31. Such data are cited by the Belarusian entrepreneurial trade union. The ones, who protested most actively were the businessmen of Minsk and Grodno. Retailers from Mogilev, Vitebsk, Gomel, Brest, Baranovichi, Bobruisk, Orsha, Volkovysk and other towns also took an active part in the event. The distinctive feature of this protest was the participation of entrepreneurs, working at the commercial stores and kiosks.

The very fact that among the dissenters were traders from expensive fairs, where the daily rent constitutes $50-100, testifies to the miserable condition in which the Belarusian business currently dwells. According to the preliminary data, 25 trade objects didn’t work in Minsk yesterday. The total amount of businessmen who never showed up at their working places and supported the strike amounts to 80 thousand.

Yesterday the “Parking” fair was closed too. Over a thousand retailers came to their trading places but didn’t sell their commodity. They protested against the Minsk city hall’s decision of February 19, 2002, obliging everyone to install cash machines at the market-places. Same demands have been put forward during the July 29 picket opposite the “Parking” center, held under the motto “No to the violation of businessmen’s rights!”. As a result, police apprehended the picket’s organizer Leonid Malakhov – co-chairman of the public organization “Private property”, sentenced to 10 days of jail.

In particular, most Brest businessmen went on a strike at the town’s flea markets, indignant over the measures, prepared by the authorities to annihilate small business. The strikers demand that the local authorities cancel the decision, under which the entrepreneurs are subject to heavy taxation.

All commodity markets of Mogilev joined in the move. Around fifty most active protesters assembled in the morning near the “Spartak” stadium in order to discuss their problems, but the official representatives ignored their claims.

It’s been two years since the last strike of the Mogilev businessmen. They usually managed to reach a consensus with the authorities there, not getting down to open protests. However, today the situation changed and the local businessmen joined the countrywide protest action with their own demands.

5 thousand retailers stopped operating at Gomel’s two largest markets. Most businessmen from the markets “Yuzhny”, “Centralny”, “Granditsky” and those from mini-markets, halted their activities too.

In the Gomel region the strikers found solidarity in the persons of traders from Svetlogorsk, Mozyr and Rogochev.

By the way, the Gomel action was joined by the sellers from Vietnam, Azerbaijan and other foreign countries, which had never been the case before.

Up to 40-70% of traders didn’t show up at work in due time in other towns. Among those who refused to uphold the action were the people, selling their stuff without proper licenses or representing state companies.

The strikers’ major demands were the following: inadmissibility of amendments to the presidential decree #12 of May 17, 2001; the start of negotiations on the issue with the representatives of business circles; cessation of the process of installing cash-desks at fairs until the issue is discussed with the entrepreneurs.

“The entrepreneurs’ striking committee forwarded a notification about the strike into the presidential administration and other responsible state bodies. The action of protest is the first from a series of scheduled national events, due to defend the entrepreneurs’ interests in summer and fall 2002,” – reads the BETU press-release.