During the last meeting of Aliaksandr Lukashenka with rectors of the universities, the president said, that the situation, when in some secondary schools there is only one lesson of Belarusian language and six lessons of English a week, is not normal. “One should know English, but one should also know his native language”, he added.
He forgot to say, that “one lesson of Belarusian a week” is a result of a very clear policy, which has been implemented during these 12 years. One after another, all rights of the Belarusian language were abolished. The best Belarusian-speaking musicians are prohibited to have concerts. The names of the best Belarusian-writing authors are prohibited to be mentioned on television. One “senator” of the upper chamber of the Parliament, a close friend of the president, has recently called “bastards” the schoolchildren who dared to protest against imposing teaching the history of Belarus in the Russian language. What do you think? He is still a close friend! Having prohibited the Belarusians to have their TV and radio stations in the Belarusian language, the state ideologists are swinging a noose, chasing the last Belarusian-language newspapers and magazines. During the “Lukashenka period” (1994-2006) more Belarusian-language mass media have been shut down, than during the times of the tsarist and Polish “readjustment” rule together... In the face of all these problems, one feels almost ashamed to mention such a “petty detail” as abandoning synchronizing the children cartoon films in the Belarusian language since 1997. The cartoons are being synchronizing only by the volunteers from the “damned opposition”.
And after the president is looking for somebody to blame who prevents children from knowing, speaking, and reading Belarusian?
Belarusian will become the equal language among the equal only then, when the president, ministers and the mass media begin to speak it. If, like now, the state organizations refuse to hire Belarusian-speaking workers, and the cultural apartheid continues, such statements can only arouse indignation.
