Belarusian PM Dissatisfied by Government’s Work :: Charter'97 :: News

The Prime-Minister of Belarus Gennady Novitsky evaluated the Cabinet’s work in the year 2002 as “unsatisfactory”. Reporting to president Lukashenko, the Premier confessed that out of 16 crucial parameters of social-economic development, they only fulfilled eight. Meantime, Novitsky underscored that they have certain prerequisites for meeting the criteria for the following year and pleaded with the head of state “to let them keep working”.

Alexander Lukashenko declared this year to be the “year of protecting population from the government”. According to Lukashenko, “this year we’ll defend the nation from arbitrariness, which you provoke, stealing the last money from their pockets and even sometimes taking away from them empty wallets, where you haven’t put a penny before”. In this connection Alexander Lukashenko raised a few paramount tasks before the Cabinet of Ministers and set concrete deadlines for their fulfillment – the end of the first quarter of the year. “If you realize that you will fail your duties anyway, file in resignation right away,” – said the head of state addressing top governmental officials.

In the first quarter of the year the government is supposed to decisively deal with the problems, occurring in the public utilities sector, transportation, healthcare, education, kindergartens and holiday hotels business. When speaking about the price-growth in the Belarusian housing sector, Lukashenko stated that they “extorted too much from the population over the last year.”