Decisions have been made: time to fulfil them

At a meeting with senior officials of the Council of Ministers, the President of Belarus discussed a wide range of issues: from combating the pandemic and fake news, protecting personal information to stimulating the use of electric vehicles

About electric vehicles

Aleksandr Lukashenko sets the task of expanding the use of electric transport in Belarus. The Head of State stressed that this is one of the most promising areas. “The global practice shows that the decision to develop and introduce infrastructure for it [electric transport] was right. Virtually all countries are doing it today. It’s also important for us as we don’t have abundant oil resources and have recently launched the Belarusian nuclear power plant,” the President believes.
Alongside purely economic aspects, the ecological dimension of this problem is also important, and therefore it’s impossible in any case to not create the proper conditions for the functioning of this new sphere, said the Belarusian leader.
About a year ago, it was decided to provide a number of benefits to increase the interest of the population in purchasing light electric vehicles. According to the Government, this practice has paid off.
“Now there is a need to introduce additional incentives,” noted Aleksandr Lukashenko.

About the rise in prices and incomes of the population

At the meeting, the Head of State put special emphasis on the task of curbing the rise in prices.
“We are approaching a winter period and in addition to the COVID-19 response, we need to curb the price rise so that people will not have to struggle to survive. This pertains first and foremost to food prices,” specified the President.
He noted that the issue of price increases is very sensitive for the population, “There is a topic, and it is very important and correct, which is often raised by people: the ratio of rising prices and incomes of the population. People don’t care how high prices in supermarkets are if they have enough money in their pockets to buy goods at these prices. This ratio and this balance must be maintained at all costs,” stressed the Head of State.
In his opinion, it is necessary to explain to people more carefully that prices for goods and services are interconnected with the financial condition of enterprises, on which, in turn, the prosperity of workers depends, “The rise in prices for some goods means the well-being of those workers that produce these goods. If the price for a tractor rises, then the tractor plant and its workers receive more money. But farmers don’t care about the well-being of a tractor plant and its workers. They are always complaining about growing prices for tractors. Or let’s take another topic of the day: rising prices for food. Urban dwellers do not rejoice in rising prices for potatoes or other products and thus additional earnings for farmers or collective farms. Citizens are not interested in this, and people don’t think like that. We need to explain this to people.”

About fakes

Aleksandr Lukashenko spoke about fake information that appears on the Internet and in some media outlets, “We need to address many issues. These issues will be brought to us from different sides. Of course, I do not want to enumerate those fakes, but the State Control Committee checked a few things during the night and again in the morning. You would be really astonished by some of things that are reported. They will write that hundreds of people are dying in hospitals, that we do not have enough oxygen, medications, treatment and other things. I can say that 99.8 percent of this information is fake. But everybody should understand that all information is scrutinised.”
In conclusion, the President reminded everyone of his demand for the strict implementation of all management decisions taken, “I want to warn you once again. If we reach an agreement on something and make a decision, you must fulfil it. This is the main thing today. This is the issue of our survival. Otherwise, we will be destroyed. We need to survive and preserve our state.”

Based on materials of sb.by and belta.by