VITEBSK, 2 September (BelTA) – As he met with students of Vitebsk Oblast higher education institutions during a Q&A session titled as “Open microphone with the president” on 2 September, Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko gave advice on how not to fall for provocations using his own experience in 2020 when protests and the COVID-19 pandemic happened, BelTA has learned.
The president was asked what advice he could give to young Belarusians regarding ways to avoid falling for provocations. “There are two rules. First, you have to understand the situation and the subject matter. Second, there is no need to rush. Patience is the key. I am not a good example of that. I am more emotional: storm the barricades, start the fight and sort it out later on. Things have happened like that. But as I grow older, I start thinking in favor of waiting it out, looking around, and seeing how things turn out,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said.
Continuing the line of thought, he remarked that Belarusians are known to be reasonable and are known to possess the best qualities of the Jewish nation. A lot of Jews lived in Belarus back in the day. “And we’ve borrowed a lot from them. We’ve borrowed a lot from those smart people and the smart nation,” the president remarked.
“Being reasonable and trying to avoid doing damage are not always a bad thing. But it slows down progress at times. This is why I sometimes make off-the-cuff decisions. Patience is the key,” the Belarusian leader is convinced.
Tapping into his own experience, Aleksandr Lukashenko said that he is in no rush to make decisions when he fails to completely understand a situation. “Patience. Stay patient even if it is very difficult,” he stressed.
The president recalled protests in Minsk in 2000 where the number of protesters peaked at about 47,000 people. “I’ve never talked about it. The situation was serious,” he remarked.
Various options were offered to the head of state back then, including calls for “giving them what for”: “Look where they walk about. They will come to the Palace of Independence tomorrow.”
“I said: calm down. I understand that if they capture the central nexus of power, then it will be a signal to everyone, to the nation that the government has changed. I understood it. But I felt I should be calm and shouldn’t rush things. So they kept walking and walking… But once we scared them off outside the Palace of Independence, they understood that jokes are over, that assault rifles are in our hands. But we didn’t shoot at anyone. Patience all the way… Till the very last. If they start murdering you, then you have to respond,” the Belarusian leader said.
The president used the same approach to make decisions during the COVID-19 pandemic when Belarus followed its own course without enforcing a lockdown and without giving away money for free. “It is a fact that they wanted to simply destroy, ruin, and merge to something countries just like Belarus which are dependent on resources, raw materials, and markets,” the head of state is convinced.
Aleksandr Lukashenko recalled how he had forbidden the Healthcare Ministry to shut down organizations and enterprises and how he had instructed the ministry to focus on healing people. “While I will shut down universities or someone else will upon my instructions. Frankly speaking, it was quite a tough conversation [with the healthcare minister]. And having analyzed all of that, having gotten over all of that… You need patience. You shouldn’t rush things. Belarus was the world’s only country to follow down its own path. We saved people without locking down anything. I went to intensive care units myself. I went to so many places. And I caught this so-called virus and got over it,” the head of state recalled.
The president stressed that the true cause of a disease is often in the head. “An illness is not about the heart, the lungs, or the liver. They are susceptible to diseases. But if you get sick, you should first get your head straight. Then you will get sick less. Therapy, pediatrics, and the rest are experience. They are edifices. The traditional Chinese medicine is strong not because of the axe and the scalpel but because of psychology, herbs and something else. Meals, air, water, and so on. I’ve told you about that. Those are important. The rest are manipulations. Certainly, you cannot do without them. There are medics over there. They have learned how to do miracles now. Our Belarusian medics have,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said.
Returning to the matter of how one can avoid provocations, the head of state concluded: “You have to know the subject matter and you shouldn’t rush things. Don’t rush is my advice to you. Never be in a rush. Clench your teeth. Be patient. Keep watching until you make sure whether the decision you intend to make is the right one or not due to your experience and knowledge.”
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