Without any Maidan: the Russian language is being intensively eliminated from the Belarusian public space
The Belarusian authorities began to carry out de-Russification more intensively.
Belarusian public figure Andrei Ivanov stated this on the BelRusInfo YouTube channel, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“Today they called me and asked why in Brest, after repairs at the bus station, the inscription in Belarusian was left, but the one in Russian was removed. Why is it in Belarusian, English and Chinese at the airport? Why is public transport in Belarusian and English today? Are these two official languages? Russian is becoming obsolete. De-Russification is noticeable to people. It gets on the nerves, people start to worry. Perhaps it is beneficial for someone to engage in de-Russification,” Ivanov said.
Let us remind you that in Belarus there are two equal state languages – Belarusian and Russian. However, in practice, small numbers of Belarusian speakers dominate public life.
In April, nationalists managed to deprive physical education teacher Inna Kordabneva from the regional center of Klimovichi of her bonus because she spoke unflatteringly about the Belarusian language in her blog. Two months earlier, an IT specialist from Minsk, Olga Malkina, was not only fired from her job, but also fined in court for a post against language on Facebook.
In March in Braslov, a “concerned citizen” ensured that local authorities reprimanded utility workers for writing English transliterations of Russian rather than Belarusian street names on signs. Braslav utility workers received a reprimand. At the same time, in Minsk, a nationalist caused a scandal in one of the sports clubs because a Russian citizen who worked there could not serve him in Belarusian.
In February, nationalist-minded youth of Minsk staged a mocking flash mob in a coffee shop at the Kommunarka confectionery factory after one of them, Aramais Mirakyan, wrote on social networks that they rudely refused to serve him in Belarusian. Later it turned out that the young man lied.
The “public” demanded to cancel the display of videos in Russian in Minsk minibuses.
In August 2019, Belarusian nationalists began harassing a citizen who opposed the placement of a provocative poster in the Minsk metro.
And in May, the Belarusian opposition artist Ales Pushkin filed a complaint with the prosecutor's office of the city of Krupki against Pavel Chirkov, an employee of the Evroopt store, who refused to speak Belarusian with him.
Belarusian nationalists also tried to achieve the replacement of Russian-language signs in the city of Braslav, and organized an action to Belarusize public transport in Orsha. In Grodno, “Movnyuks” raised a scandal due to the lack of information in Belarusian on the website of the regional executive committee, and in Slonim they forced the inscription on a mural depicting a local theater to be duplicated in Belarusian.
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