Opinions & Interviews

Lukashenko assigns tasks to municipal authorities

MINSK, 18 June (BelTA) – Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko made a number of personnel decisions on 18 June. As part of the process he encouraged heads of municipal government agencies to pay close attention to performance discipline and the improvement of efficiency of underperforming agricultural enterprises, BelTA has learned.

Aleksandr Lukashenko said: “We’ve learned how to sow, harvest, and grow crops but [violations] of the performance discipline sometimes ruin everything. Performance discipline is the ultimate priority. Things will not work out without it. Don’t shout, moan, and sob that the market will fix everything. It has not fixed anything over a quarter of the century. We need discipline.”

“We don’t have money to waste. Neither an oil pipe nor a gas pipe generates profits while we sleep. We don’t earn money by doing nothing. We have to do everything with our own hands,” the Belarusian leader continued. “We could give it up hoping that the market will pull through if we had a huge sack of easy money on our hands. Since oil prices have doubled, someone has twice as much money. Gas prices have increased in wake of the oil price hike and now someone has money. We don’t. This is why we have to rely on the human factor. And discipline is central to the human factor.”

The president stressed that executive personnel have to assign tasks and oversee their fulfillment. “We need a clear-cut system and we have to demand that people do their jobs. People need to know what to do. Stay on top of it. When one follows things closely, things get done. Once you relax a bit, some people start slacking off.”

Aleksandr Lukashenko pointed out that the lack of discipline and wise management, for instance, in agribusiness enterprises leads to serious consequences like loss of cattle and breakdowns of expensive machines and equipment.

“And pay most of your attention to the agricultural enterprises that are a bit weak now. There are 3-4 of them out of 12-15 agricultural enterprises in a district. Not more than that. The rest work well,” the president told heads of municipal government agencies. “It is primarily your area of responsibility. You will be made answerable for every weak agricultural enterprise like that.” As for personnel shortage in some regions, the head of state reminded about employer-sponsored education and mandatory job assignment after graduation. “You have to adapt to the personnel potential that we have. Don’t whine all the time that you don’t have specialists,” he remarked. “You have to maneuver and adjust to the situation.”

“And don’t get involved in the issues that can be resolved without your assistance,” Aleksandr Lukashenko added. “Feel free to visit good agricultural enterprises in order to rest your soul. Don’t interfere with their work.”

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