Aleksandr Lukashenko makes personnel decisions

On 10 December President of the Republic of Belarus Aleksandr Lukashenko made a number of personnel decisions. The head of state appointed:

The President also approved the appointment of:

When appointing new Culture Minister, Aleksandr Lukashenko noted that Boris Svetlov was already familiar with the sphere of culture: “You have trained personnel for the Culture Ministry and the sphere of culture overall. I have to say that you have considerably improved the operation of the Culture University and the way things are organized over there”. “Therefore, I have great hopes regarding your forthcoming work in the Culture Ministry. I hope and think that it will be a significant step forward, all the problems and difficulties of our cultural sphere notwithstanding,” said the President. “You know the Culture Ministry inside out. Everyone knows and respects you. You saw these problems relatively from the sidelines, you knew about shortcomings in our sphere of culture, and should be able to improve things in this regard”.

The head of state underlined that a good infrastructure of cultural institutions had been created at all levels from the countryside to Minsk. “Every agro-town has a community center and a good one at that. No country can boast such an infrastructure from the countryside to the capital city”.

Aleksandr Lukashenko asked to pay close attention to the new premises of the Great Patriotic War Museum, which are under construction. The new building should be a temple, a truly worthy museum, said the President.

The head of state also gave instructions regarding the future development of the National History Museum: “One should have a look at these exhibitions. A statesman’s approach should be used as it is the custom in Belarus. It should have grass roots, too”.

The implementation of the government program for reviving the technology to make Slutsk belts will be another important area for the new Culture Minister to focus efforts on. “We should advance the project. It should be decent and in no way false. Those manufacturing technologies have to be revived. We may make few belts initially but they should be as good as those made in the past,” said Aleksandr Lukashenko.

The head of state gave instructions regarding the completion of the reconstruction of the Yanka Kupala National Academic Theater as soon as possible. “I have been promised that the new theater will stage Pavlinka in a new way. I’d be glad to come and see it. The theater will be one of the best theaters in Europe. It will have the latest technologies in everything – the stage and conditions for artists alike”.

All in all, Aleksandr Lukashenko remarked that all the conditions have been created in Belarus for creative people to manifest themselves.

Addressing Alexander Pereslavtsev, the President noted that his appointment is attributed, among other things, to his successful work in the previous position. “Your company, which is now the holding company (Belorusskiye Oboi) is a well-performing and successful enterprise. It has not failed,” the President noted.

“We have a lot of problems in the woodworking industry. You are aware of the tough decisions I have made. I could not forgive the former top officials this delay with capacity building. It entailed certain losses. However, you never stopped, you came up with something new. Therefore, you stayed afloat. Others should have followed suit. However, those nine huge factories missed the deadline even on the projects where a presidential decree was signed,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said.

“Now they are trying to catch up hastily. All my unpopular decisions regarding dismissals and efforts to keep personnel at those factories were made not because there is a shortage of human resources there. We just needed to impose some order there. Money squandering is unacceptable,” the head of state underlined.

The President demanded that all the issues related to the woodworking industry should be resolved as fast as possible: “Next year we should commission most of these facilities. It is not only about money. Other countries keep commissioning new production facilities. The first one to come to a new market will dominate it. The demand for these products is huge”.

Aleksandr Lukashenko noted that he is set to tour woodworking factories in Mogilev and Vitebsk soon to discuss upgrade plans.