Today it’s the 15th anniversary of Belarusian President Lukashenka in power.
It’s a strange feeling – that’s half of my life. Sometimes I feel as a linguistic invalid. With a new regulation introduced 4 years ago I got used to apply the word president to the one and only position in the country. And feel ill at ease to refer to him as to “the current president”. He is The President here.
But no comments from my part. The quintessence of the years could be followed through Lukashenka’s quotes. I’ve tried to pick out those that don’t lose their meaning without the context. Anyway direct quotations often say more than they read.
- “I am the president of the country and this country will be [=exist] until I am the president.”
- “We falsified the latest election [in March 2006], I’ve already told westerners about this. As many as 93.5 percent voted for President Lukashenka. They say it is not a European figure. We turned it into 86 [percent]. This did take place. And if we now start recounting ballots, I don’t know what we should do with them.”
- “I enjoy playing football and hockey, but most often I play alone.”
- “I want you to wear your own and eat your own [products]. They are probably packed not as good as the foreign things, but today we don’t have enough foreign currency.”
- “I am confident that the Europeans will come crawling to Belarus to ask for co-operation in the fight against drug trafficking and illegal migration.”
- “I think Americans realised that Belarus is the key country in Europe and they need to cooperate with it.”
- “Our “dictatorship” doesn’t hinder anyone’s life or development.”
- “I am pretty tired of the question of the so called political prisoners. There are no political crimes therefore there can be no political prisoners. They are ordinary criminals <…> We released them.”
- “Those <detained during demonstrations> were unconscious and blind drunk, 10-15 days arrests’ were necessary for them to recover themselves.”
- “What kind of opposition is that? They’ve been fighting in the centre of Europe for more than 20 years, I guess, and still can’t put at least one man into the parliament – to be honest, even with the support of the authorities.”
- “Those who drink – you’d better not vote for me, I won’t be a friend of yours.”
- “All these years I’ve been carefully and reverently carrying this clear, crystal vase called Belarus.”
- “The situation in Belarus is unique as I don’t owe anything to anyone.”
Tags: Lukashenka, power, quotes
#1 by Yogi Bear on July 11th, 2009 - 2:30 am
Depending on how good your English is the names of several recent leaders of enigmatic states all have appropriate tags in them.
For example ‘Sad’ am Hussein, I hope you get that one as it is a little tearful? Then we have Kim Jong “Ill” which is a bit pale and in need of medical care. How about Ach mad A mad inijad?” Clearly he needs to see the Psychiatrist. And who recalls the names of the combatants in the last days of Yougoslavia? Panic meets Slob odan? what more does it take to start a fight between such predispositions?
But if these names mark their owners for History what are we to make of Luckashenka? I can find nothing in this name to suggest the fate of the owner.
Perhaps in some other language his fate is there for all to see?
Still! Maryna you write well, and the quotations enlighten us a little, well perhaps more than that.
If history is in any way consistent what is happening in Russia will soon come to Belarus and that may occur sooner rather than later because in the end even a hangover from a failed economic system can see the money flying all over Moscow, Yekaterinburg, St Pertersburg etc. How blind can one be? Plus many people in Belarus have relatives living the high life in the RF and surely ‘The President’ has a few such relatives himself.
#2 by Lawrence on July 11th, 2009 - 11:38 am
How about
Bar roso, Pot erring, S(h)arko, Tit mayer, Tri chet,
Ott marr Is sing, Dues in berg, Bolk (frank) in stein,
Maggot wall storm, Neelie Crows, Ill ka late inen,
Laz loo Ko vacs, Loo is me shell,
Nee kos diamond orros, Da nuda hubner
Angel a Murk el, Benito F errer o wald nerd,
Jacques sant err, Valery Gis card d’e stung,
Couch ner, Josh ka fish er, Stavros dim as,
Francois fill on, Edourd Balle a dour, Al moon ia,
Jean Luc de hen, Jose Maria Gil Robeless,
Rob ert schu man, Jean mon net,
#3 by Maryna Rakhlei on July 11th, 2009 - 9:09 pm
Put in? Look ash enka? What could you do to my last name??
#4 by Maryna Rakhlei on July 11th, 2009 - 9:58 pm
Yogi Bear,
the greatest success of The President is that he has still managed not to let the Russian money overtake the key enterprises. That’s one of the main disputes between Minsk and Moscow. RF would like to see more market economy in Belarus but we can’t allow it now for a number of reasons.
And I wouldn’t speak of consistence here… Russia’s oil-money didn’t bring any change to the low middle class of the country. It did in Belarus: as there was abundance of money, the working class, the low middle class led a far better life than their relatives (or “relatives”?) in RF. And they still do! I know that Russia is somewhat bigger but still. Belarus could build and re-build a lot. Regrettably, for most part the facades, not the economy, for eg.
What comes to the president… Lukashenka doesn’t have a lot of relatives: he grew up without a father, all of his mother’s family are in the village where he grew up. No relatives in Russia! And no friends, I guess.
#5 by Yogi Bear on July 12th, 2009 - 2:26 am
Maryna
@ 3
Thank you! I love the ‘Put in’, but how about ‘Look a hen (chicken) ka’ Your name is hard to get a twist from, I should be Baba whathername? Try “Mar y…Nah ain’t workin” ….lol
@ 4
In that case I should have consulted my old friend Stasi huh?
Still, as you say the President is holding back the flood of investment money. But what is that achieving? Raises a few prices? no? yes?
And when the wall comes down will the economy be washed away by the flood of funds coming in?
I think it would be better to let some investment happen and gradually ease out of the old ways into the new, than to try to completely stop everything.
But as you say, many people in Belarus have a good standard of living so they probably don’t care about it.
You may or may not have noticed on this website the many bloggers who seem to have nothing else to do except pound out their flacid emptiness on sites such as this, endlessly repeating the same old dogmas – usually invented from their author’s paranoia – to everybody. Whether they hate the EU, or the US, or Russia or whatever it is that makes them mad. E.g. Barroso is a dictator, Bush is a criminal, Obama is with Osama in Cairo in a Hareem doing un-natural things, the EU is a crime and so on.
But I find their commentary remarkably absent in such as this topic, which to be fair isn’t about anything that they could hate. I mean when have you ever heard of a kook who hates a kook?
Which reminds me, I read some months ago, an account of “The President” which alleges that he made a law preventing anybody from taking a photo, or video, of the back of his head; and, the article then reports the reason ” The President is bald!”
Well I don’t see any baldness? Do you?
“Booboo take my tray back to the pickinik table and fill it again”
#6 by Maryna Rakhlei on July 12th, 2009 - 11:35 am
Yogi Bear!
If you don’t let big money in, you have the control. That’s the problem with the market economy here. I guess they are afraid to lose the overview and can’t slacken the rains. Btw absence of ties with the world economy helps us survive the global economic crisis.
But we do have some investment projects and businesman from all over the world. The scale is pretty unimportant. Some couple of months ago Lukashenka was instisting that each and every ministry should now be the ministry of ecomony and try to sell everything we produce whatever the amount (“one tractor, a spoonful of sugar”). They are also looking for investment possibilities.
As to the forum… It’s the matter of interest, not love/hate. If you understand certain situation you can easily follow its delevopment and comment on it. Who is interested in Belarus? who has been here? Some would ask, why does one need a blog from Belarus on euObs? My persistent reporting on The President, is it not perverse?
and your interest in it 
Stasi had a great idea that outlived the country. Selling political prisoners. We don’t do it for money as the Germans but can perfectly use the “crooks”. I was thinking of a post on this…
As far as I know there are no regulations how to take pictures of Lukashenka, but a trusted circle of photographers who are allowed to come closer. But there’s a rule to use the word president only to refer to the head of the country. I rewrite president of Europarliament and presidents of the banks into chairpersons very quickly. Actually that’s handy: you have a word for a person. A lot of marynas but one President. Why bald? The punch line should be “The President is naked!”
#7 by Maryna Rakhlei on July 12th, 2009 - 11:36 am
Put-in is not my invention, that was the Georgian song (uncle Google should know “We don’t wanna put in”) for Eurovision-09, it was banned from participation.
#8 by Yogi Bear on July 13th, 2009 - 2:13 am
@6 Maryna
Well you are right, and I mistaken on the exchange thing. If one can control goods to the market then the money becomes irrelevant. Refusal to sell? but then the buyer is moving to the next merchant, so what does it achieve?
Still, if the economy is a person and the free market a food, then a small taste of the new desert in order to savor it is better than gorging, which, as you quite rightly point out, will often give the diner wind….lol
You know, probably better than most in the business, that it is the things we take for granted in our environment that are the most missed when we leave home. Here, where I live, grows a nut bearing tree, and at certain times of the year the ground is everywhere covered with these nuts. Now you might think that people would collect and sell them, but you’d be wrong. What happens to the nuts is that they decompose into the earth and enrich it, and yes some nuts do get collected and dried for human consumption but most end up fertilizing the earth. BTW animals such as squirrels and pet dogs etc eat these nuts until they cannot take another bite, and I can vouch to you that the nuts are very delicious!
So selling things by the spoonful might not be such a bad idea if what is in the spoon is unique to Belarus. Now don’t say I put bad capitalist ideas in your pretty little head! I deny it! But I confess the thought has crossed my mind a couple of times…lol
The forum, were what you believe true! could be a great thing It is not, I am saddened to have to reply! Here in the west some people have become so nihilistic that they hate even themselves and cannot say even one nice thing! They complain about the EU saying it is an Empire, a Dictatorship, a repressive bad thing that oppresses freedom. Then we learn that many of these great wits! are on the EU welfare, blogging on EU websites and often getting paid by the enemies of the EU to do what they do!
So no! it is not just for fun that many come here, sorry to have to tell you.
Who is interested in Belarus? well everybody is. In the west in the old days I used read all the great Russian authors and loved the books very much because like many of my peers we heard very little from behind the iron curtain. People simply did not know anything about Russia or any other state in the bloc.
Mostly people today in the west are utterly intrigued by Belarus, Ukraine, Russia and the rest simply because they want to experience these places! They want to drink tea from a samovar, they want to see a real korubushka, they want to feel the culture, to eat the food, to drink the wine, to drink the beer, to be in it!
People out here aren’t ignoring Belarus, nothing could be farther from the truth. I might be an exception in that I have always loved Russia and the region very much! and I am proud to say it too! In other words it isn’t just the economy that interests me, it is much more the culture and the people themselves that I like! So this page is but a small window on a massive wall that faces us outside your cosy little heaven in the east!
Am I saying there should be more Belarus on the Interenet? Yes I am saying that.
Ah the beautiful Stasi! well she and ‘the’ agency too, and yes I would love to read your blog and report on the use of assets for improving the environment; after all, we here make them clean the highway and fix the railroad lines…lol
The photo report could have been a scam, and as you noted there is no record of it there, so it has to be lies.
But still you did not disagree with me when I noted that he is not bald!
Now a question for you to research. Many years ago I had a dear Russian friend who used a great amount of herbs and such to create a ’scent’ or aroma in his/her house. That aroma stayed in my memory for decades and yet it was only when once again I experienced it that I began to ask what on earth ii is? It smells a little like lemon and heather mixed up? I hope I am being clear upon this!
@7
But OC “Put in” isn’t any body’s idea, because on the internet everything is copied! We are adults but we love childish things that humor us! Is this a crime? I don’t think so, after all Mr Tolstoy said as much. And notice that few out here, besides those you cite, have anything bad to say about Vladimir! On the contrary he is very well liked in the west, almost more than some of our own leaders.
Wishing you and those you love many Blessings, on this Holy and Special evening, Sunday! July 12 Sbacibe
“Where is my umbrella Booboo? it looks like rain is coming in soon”
#9 by Maryna Rakhlei on July 15th, 2009 - 5:19 pm
Yogi Bear,
back to the economy. Let’s say, you are a state, you own all the key factories and want to control them. You are not interested in the market economy and competition. You don’t even want Russian goods as they are often cheaper. All you are interested in is export. That’s the reason for the steps we’ve taken recently: we need markets of the EU coutries and it was very painful as Russia banned our dairy exports.
I am pro-Belarus, for the export growth, for saving jobs, etc. But we can’t allow it ourselves. Unfortunately. The methods, the system , the production lines, too many things are outdated.. China sells, we don’t.
Nihilism comes along with education and relative prosperity, I guess. There’s even a discussion here on the films produced. Most of them tell us how awfully difficult and disgusting life is.
And I would insist there’s no interest in Belarus. Why people would know us? Because of the “dictatorship” brand? Yes. And there’s a general lack of interest to the news from outside own countries and your cities. No wonder nobody knows we don’t use samovar or what the culture life in Belarus is like
I have no idea if Lukashenka is bald or not. I could tell you about his recent interview for Die Presse He is also pretty young. He will turn 55 at the end of August.
Btw the Austrian paper puts as the headline L’s quote about Russia. Because they can sell it better! Not that they like “Vladimir” – Russia is big, powerful and important. Belarus is something one can ignore…
To the scent question. Hmm, was is thyme? a small plant with small purple flowers?
#10 by Marcel on July 21st, 2009 - 4:22 am
Lukashenko is actually MORE democratic than anyone in the EU Commission/Politburo.
The EU Commission/Politburo is not elected at all, just a corrupt deal by the governments who appoint a bunch of people so they can bypass the national parliaments.
When it comes to democracy: Belarus > EU
#11 by Maryna Rakhlei on July 21st, 2009 - 4:34 pm
All right.
So what’s democracy?
Accroding to you elections=democracy. But elections in Belarus haven’t been internationally recognised as democratic for years, i.e for Europe they are no elections. No elections=no democracy.
Tell me, for eg. if you enjoy the rule of law in your own country, why should you care how EU Commission members are appointed?
#12 by Yogi Bear on July 21st, 2009 - 4:34 pm
@Maryna
Ok if you have old inefficient out of date technology and the the price of your products is high compared with the competition, then you will not sell as much as they do. The other problem with ‘market’ economies – korubushka knows this more than the smartest economist ! – is that they are not regulated by anything other than demand. One cannot legislate demand for a product in an open market!
Outside of Belarus there is no regulated market! It is all open and free, that is why cheap Chinese products sell and everybody else does not!
This applies to everybody not just Belarus. And recall the Gorbachov reforms? See it is not easy to move from one system to the other. There will be a lot of pain in this process, to think otherwise is foolish! But in the end it is well worth it and will put Belarus back into the forefront of progress.
But even in a free market economy we have failing industries.
Look, for example, at Tata Motors India. This company is about to decimate western auto manufacturers! Selling new Tata cars @ US $2000.00 while the out dated and unionised western makers need over ten times as much for their cars!
The writing was on the wall nearly 20 years ago! An engineering analysis back then said we could make cars like the British Mini for less than $2,500 US dollars! And what did the British unions do?
They bitched and complained and whinged until that opportunity was destroyed!
Communist production methods fail in an open market!
But Belarus is as popular as you make it!
Dictatorship could be an export commodity if it produced something nice. So lets see? How about ‘dicator’s’ furniture? gold plated telephones? velvet auto mats? gold plated bathroom suites? personal revolutionary citizens disciplinary torture chamber?
Thanks for the herbal update, but I do not think that is the correct aroma. I bet when you realize what I am describing you will laugh, because it is so common in eastern Europe.
:0)
#13 by Maryna Rakhlei on August 12th, 2009 - 3:56 pm
Yogi Bear,
sure, the transition period demands time and effort – hopefully it’s not going to be too long and painful!
Selling the Soviet way we might look and organising tours “Back in USSR” could pay off. But – it would mock the way we are not just the past. And to show off own disabilities is no fun to do. If you don’t respect your country, nobody would respect it. You know what I mean?
As to herbs… honestly I have no idea what you have in mind