"Investigate and imprison them. And the minister too." Lukashenka gave his appointees a dressing-down for spoiled fertilizers

Anatoly Isachenka, Chairman of the Mahilioŭ Regional Executive Committee, and Yuri Horlaŭ, Minister of Agriculture and Food, listen to Lukashenka's threats. Screenshot from video

Lukashenka reminded his subordinates that earlier, when fertilizer prices were high on external markets, Belarus still provided domestic producers with significant volumes at affordable prices. He claimed the task was to use these resources as efficiently as possible to get a good harvest. He said he was asked to sell the fertilizers at a high price, but he fundamentally refused so that local farmers could have them.

However, according to Lukashenka, facts of negligent storage and use of these fertilizers were discovered in a number of farms.

Lukashenka sharply criticized the situation, stating that the state had effectively lost money because it could have sold the products more expensively on external markets, but instead directed them to the country's internal needs.

He instructed to conduct an audit throughout the country and bring the perpetrators to justice, tasking Vasily Gerasimov, Chairman of the State Control Committee, with this issue.

"Vasily Nikolaevich, investigate and imprison them across the entire country. There will be more than 10 people. And the minister will be the eleventh. Because you will be there. Enough joking with them. And deal with the chairmen of the district executive committees. What kind of business is this?"

Lukashenka gave Anatoly Isachenka, Chairman of the Mahilioŭ Regional Executive Committee, a dressing-down for failing to follow his previous wise instructions. He tried to object timidly:

— Well, but we found out how much ourselves.

— And why didn't you do what I instructed you to? It had to be done overnight. 

— It's bad to answer when... Well, Aliaksandr Ryhoravich, we are guilty. [...]

— Listen, the president, a dictatorship in the country, gives an instruction, and subordinates don't comply. Well, what is this?

Even Vasily Gerasimov stood up for the officials:

"No, well, they did something there... There are even photos."

Lukashenka, however, was unstoppable:

"He will find people across the country and take them to Kubrakov's pre-trial detention center. And then we'll sort it out. And the chairmen of the district executive committees will follow. I appoint them, I tell them: be presidents on your land. What prevents you from managing? And as for Shuleika (Deputy Prime Minister, responsible for agriculture. — Ed.) and Horlaŭ, I'll find out how to question them — you will answer to the fullest extent if you don't understand what I'm saying." 

He claims that officials do not understand not only the money they could have received, but also the political benefits of all this: "they would have wiped the nose of those Latvians and other idiots."

• 1
• 0
• 20
• 10
• 0
• 0
• 3
• 1