New anti-redtape procedure tested

The new Annex to Directive 2 adds responsibilities for the officials and their regular duties like holding more frequent hot lines and meetings with citizens. Attitude to the citizens should be friendly, and in each case of the formal attitude and prejudice should warrant checks!

Euroradio wanted to know if the officials will be closer to the electorate. For that they turned to the chief of the ideology department of the Vitsebsk Oblast Executive Committee, Alyaksandr Klitsunou.

"Since January, in each regional executive committee we have held Saturday hot lines. We'll soon have another one on Wednesdays. Earlier, we met with the citizens once a month, now it is four times, as there are a lot of appeals, it will reduce the queue. The authorities must meet with the people," said Alyaksandr about the new directive which he thought was not all that new in itself.

Officials at the Minsk Regional Executive Committee read the amendments to the anti-bureaucratic directive, but refused to comment with the words "I understand, I'm at work". So much for the friendly attitude of the citizens. The directive also provides an evaluation system of the government institutions. For that kind of attitude, I would give zero points.

Officials from Brest Regional Executive Committee read the directive with me since they had just received it. They are still "to develop measures" but "will do everything possible".

"The directive is the same, but maybe it was updated, so we were more attentive to the problems of citizens," said to me Brest officials.

The Ministry of Labour did not comment on the directive, because the development of the de-bureaucratization measures can last up to three months!

"We have been and remain most open to our citizens. We have days of information, we have hot lines and provide open information on this site. It seems like our officials in the Minsk City Executive Committee are the most open!" stresses the Press Secretary of the Minsk City Executive Committee, Ilona Nemava.

There is one problem though: just a few people go to the website! Only journalists, not ordinary people. In Minsk City Executive Committee we were told that Belarusians prefer the telephone, as people believe that it helps to solve problems more effectively."

There are going to solve the bureaucracy issue online.