Lukashenko held working meeting with Kochanova
Aleksandr Lukashenko held a working meeting with Natalya Kochanova, the Chairperson of the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly
The President drew attention to the fact that Natalya Kochanova holds many meetings with people and communicates with the population via telephone calls, so he asked in this regard, “What do people say? I have also met a lot of people lately. Maybe people do not tell me as much as they tell you, so this is very important.”
The second question deals with the plans of the Council of the Republic for the near future. One more topic of discussion determined by the President was the expert council established under the upper house of Parliament, “What do you really see, in what direction should we move here so that we can adopt more verified and precise laws in our state?”
Commenting on the results of the working meeting, Natalya Kochanova told journalists that she had reported to the Head of State on the moods and questions of Belarusian citizens, “The main thing in our policy is people. The way our people live today worries us too, because we are a body of territorial representation. The questions are completely different, but we make a cut as a whole. I want to say that people are very kind towards their country. Seeing what is happening in the world, they probably assess everything that is going on in our country somewhat differently: when food security is ensured, when there is peace and tranquillity on our streets. People do appreciate it.”
The speaker of the upper house of Parliament added that the current questions that citizens have primarily relate to housing and communal services. These are the issues that should be mainly decided by local authorities. At the same time, all appeals received by the Council of the Republic are kept under control.
The Head of State particularly touched upon the work of the expert council under the Council of the Republic. As Natalya Kochanova explained, the expert council considers all bills and regulations with the involvement of the interested circle of people. According to her, the major criterion in the work of this structure is the relevance of the legislation.
“The main thing is the relevance of the issue, how much it is necessary to regulate this issue normatively or legislatively. This comes first. Of course, the impact on our society is also taken into account: is it timely? Sometimes it is proposed to consider issues that, in my opinion, are completely irrelevant.”
The Chairperson of the Council of the Republic stressed that the country has adopted an updated Constitution, and in its development it is necessary, first of all, to consider incoming bills and legal acts.
“Of the 131 documents that came to our expert council, only 27 percent were accepted immediately. As far as the remaining are concerned, there were either comments, or we decided that the consideration of the regulatory legal act at the moment is inappropriate,” Ms. Kochanova noted.
