Entrepreneurs vs. the government – who will endure whom

photo by onliner.by

The Anticrisis Forum ended, entrepreneurs haven’t come back to markets, the government promises to answer them by the end of the week, the supporter of street protests was forced out by Perspective.

Just as Anatoly Shumchanka, the leader of the Republican Public Association Perspective has recently forecasted in the interview with the “EuroBelarus” Information Service, there were no entrepreneurs at the Anticrisis Forum. There were promises on the part of the officials and appeals on the part of the entrepreneurs.

Speaking in front of the nearly one-and-a half-thousand audience, Andrey Miashkou, deputy head of the trade ministry's Department for the Organization of Trade and Services, promised that the situation with individual entrepreneurs would be considered at the governmental level by the end of this week. However, the official voiced a warning to the individual entrepreneurs about the responsibility for “violation of the established working hours of the retail places” unless they come to their working places by January 12. Thus, empty shopping centers and markets cannot be explained with New Year’s celebration, as the Trade Ministry did in the first days of 2016.

Let us recall that starting from 1 January 2016 in accordance with the Decree No. 222 entrepreneurs who sell products of light industry, imported from the countries of the Customs Union should provide the accompanying documents. At the same time, individual entrepreneurs claim, the majority of Russian suppliers refuse to issue documents on the origin of products or provide fake certificates. Trade without the accompanying documents is punished with fines and confiscation of goods.

The entrepreneurs interviewed by the “EuroBelarus” Information Service are not going to wait till the end of the week “for the positive solution of the issue”. However, the majority of them sets hopes for Aliaksandr Lukashenka. The appeal to the head of state with the request to solve the problem was voiced from the platform of the forum. When closing the forum, the leader of the RPA Perspective Anatoly Shumchanka called upon Lukashenka and the government to listen to the entrepreneurs’ opinion and introduce moratorium on the decree No.222.

According to Shumchanka, now “all depends on how long the entrepreneurs are going to endure – the government has shown no particular wish for the dialog; the officials are, obviously, waiting when the people’s patience runs out”.

The Forum didn’t adopt the resolution that is typical of such events. Next Forum is to take place on January 25.

The meeting hasn’t ended without a scandal. The activist of entrepreneur movement Aliaksandr Makaeu called for the individual entrepreneurs to solve their problems at the streets by means of the protest. In response to this, Anatoly Shumchanka asked his supporters to help Makaeu out. The leader of the RPA Perspective was also displeased with the presence of Tatsiana Karatkevich, presidential candidate 2015, among the entrepreneurs. Commenting upon this situation, Shumchanka called those who were trying to involve individual entrepreneurs into politics “scums and provocateurs”.

Later in his Facebook account Anatoly Shumchanka one more time recalled these events: “I still claim that those who were trying to use [people] and call upon them to go at the street for protests during the Forum are scums and mean people! I wouldn’t say a word if the place would have been different! I have the right to say so, since I have been leading people to the Square many times myself! I want everyone to remember once and forever – you cannot come to someone else’s events and use [people] for your own purpose!!! By doing so, you set up the organizers and those, who believed us and dared to come. Let me respond to such “touts”: organize your own events, call people wherever you want to and whom you want to, work with people, for God’s sake, but do not rend the air. I’m not the absolute truth, but this is the way I see the solution today, it is my right, I am responsible for that! That’s why I won’t allow anyone to use the events that we organized for their own purposes without preliminary consultations!!!”

Consultations left aside, many individual entrepreneurs say that they are demolishing their tents at markets – the endurance cannot last forever during the crisis.