All market vendors who would dare walk out in protest against government decisions would never be able to return to work, the Belarusian President stressed.
‘If you attempt to stage a strike anywhere, walk off the job, you will never return to your job,’ he said at a government conference. ‘I will make a decision: those who will close their stall in protest will never turn up there again. No one in Minsk or anywhere else in the country will allow you to rent a stall.’
‘I can sign any edict and survive a revolt by 9,000 or 10,000 entrepreneurs. It’s not you who determine the policy in the state today. But I don’t want this hotbed. I don’t want even two entrepreneurs to speak bad of me. Because I’m your president. Even if you hated me and did not vote for me, I’m your president after the election. That’s why I don’t want to hurt you,’ news agency BelaPAN quoted the head of state as saying.
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Aliaksandr Lukashenka held the meeting with top government officials to discuss a draft presidential edict that would prohibit market vendors from transporting, storing and selling goods without accompanying documents confirming their purchase, which would be complicated to fulfill because most market vendors buy their goods in Russia where accompanying documents are hard to come by. The requirement is expected to cause an outcry among small entrepreneurs.
www.belsat.eu/en, via BelaPAN
