Miachyslau Hryb: Belarusian Parliament today is a decoration, not a branch

The Belarusian parliament has ceased to make the decisions that are vital for the country long time ago.

Online space for public initiatives zvarot.by is collecting signatures under the collective appeal "On granting the report over the period of being in the status of the deputy of the House of Representatives of the Republic of Belarus".

The reason of the appeal is the low legislative activity of the House of Representatives of the 5^th convocation, which only used their right to make laws 3 times in 4 years.

The document notes that Belarusian citizens are entitled to elect their representatives to parliament to lobby the interests and concerns of all citizens.

In this regard, the MPs are asked to submit a progress report, giving detailed information on several issues: whether they have used the right of legislative initiative; which proposals have been made in the laws at issue; which queries the MPs made and how often they turned to the government for an explanation of the current economic and social policy; how often and which inquiries the MPs put in order to prevent violations of law to law enforcement, supervisory or other bodies on any matter.

The minimal use of the right of legislative initiative is one of the features of the Belarusian parliament. Although in the first half of the 20^th century the situation was the opposite.

- Draft laws in the Supreme Council were mostly developed by deputies themselves: on their own initiative, in the committees and factions. It was our prerogative, nobody was helping us, - Miachyslau Hryb, the former Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of Belarus of the 12^th convocation told to the “EuroBelarus” Information Service. – There were a lot of draft laws, both useful and useless. Therefore, a decision was made about the economic basis of each draft law, for which it was necessary to get the conclusion of the Council of Ministers. After five years of work we have adopted about 440 laws that we elaborated.

- Can you name any important draft laws elaborated by deputies?

- Yes, almost all of them were elaborated by deputies: the Constitution, the laws on defense, armed forces, police, on social and economic situation. Even all the budgets were passed by the Supreme Council. Even though the draft law on the state budget was developed in the government, it was still discussed in the committees, which were important for the final decision.

Watching the work of the House of Representatives now, I can say that after 1996 there is no Parliament as such in Belarus. It exists de jure, but de facto it doesn’t. It doesn’t pass any crucial laws. This year, the discussion on raising the retirement age is going on. As a result, the decision was adopted by the presidential decree. The discussion of socio-economic development of the country for five years didn’t take place in the Parliament, but was considered by the All-Belarusian People's Assembly that has no status at all.

The authorities don’t take the Parliament into consideration. They need it as the decoration of a democratic state; however, it has ceased to take vital for the country decisions long ago.

In accordance with the law, the deputies should be accountable to the voters. But they are not.

- Being a MP is considered to be prestigious and profitable. Which aims are the state representatives purposing by participating in the elections?

- Firstly, they step up in the power vertical. Secondly, they get close ties with the specialized parliamentary committees, which opens up new doors and that gives them patronage, new job positions for the future, and opportunities for opening a new business. And most importantly, after four years of voting "for" they are entitled to an allowance when they reach retirement age, which is several times bigger than an average pension.

- Apart from passing three laws in four years, another feature of the House of Representatives is almost 100% endorsement of draft laws. Deputies explain it by their serious work in commissions, when they already have a common position before the session. Do you agree with their arguments?

- They do it to whitewash themselves, to show how hard they are working. But this year, no one protested against the fact that the discussion on raising the retirement age and the discussion of socio-economic development of the country for five years hasn’t been discussed in the Parliament: the current deputies agree with what is elaborated by others.

- What should be done for the Parliament to stop being a decoration and start real legislative activity instead?

- I think we should get back to the system of the Supreme Council. We don’t need the two chambers of Parliament. We are a unitary state, where more than 80% consider themselves Belarusians. We don’t have separate areas, so we don’t need the Council of the Republic, which mainly consists of representatives of the president. We are neither France nor Russia.

And most importantly, the Parliament should again become a fully functioning branch. To do this, we need to share power, which is in the hands of the president now; and he doesn’t want to share and he won’t.