Belarusian movnyuks received an unexpected rebuff
The situation surrounding the Russian-language mural on the wall of a building in the Belarusian city of Slonim, which we previously reported on , has taken an unexpected turn. It's unexpected because such news from Belarus has been, unfortunately, rare lately.
This year Slonim will host the Day of Belarusian Literature, a holiday dedicated to literature, printing and culture in general. This is a fairly significant annual event in the cultural life of the country; the event is held in a new city every year. On this occasion, the locality is allocated a pleasant bonus from the republican budget for improvement, so that it gives the impression of being the cultural capital of the year.
But this year local authorities were not allowed to calmly use budget funds for the benefit of citizens. There is a breed of activists in Belarus that has received the well-deserved nickname “Movnyuks.” This is the same public that is seeking to transform the republic into something like the Baltic states or Ukraine, where everything is only in the language of the “titular” ethnic group or, at worst, in English, but in no case in “colonial” and “occupation” Russian.
As expected, they are very active and try not to miss a single opportunity to ruin the life of the Russian-speaking majority. And the authorities are increasingly meeting them halfway.
This was the case in Slonim. Movnyukov did not arrange the mural, which was made on the wall of one of the houses for the holiday. According to the flawed logic of the Zmagars, the Day of Belarusian Literature should be formalized exclusively in the Belarusian language (which is historically absolutely incorrect). Therefore, with their efforts and with the support of the main caliber of nationalist propaganda, the Nasha Niva website, an aggressive anti-Russian information campaign was organized. And the local authorities, represented by the deputy head of the ideological department, Natalya Goncharuk, initially made concessions, saying that the graffiti would be redone and translated into language.
“Nasha Niva” and the Zmagars celebrated their next “peramoga” as usual.
But this time the nationalists and de-Russifiers did not have to rejoice for long. Other activists, representatives of the public associations “Rus”, “Civil Harmony”, and simply citizens, outraged by the fact that the authorities, at the instigation of the nationalists, are again relegating the language spoken by the vast majority of the population to secondary roles, have begun to write to the Slonim district executive committee.
And the local authorities listened to their arguments!
The Deputy Chairman of the Slonim District Executive Committee treated the issue more responsibly. An official with the Polish name Teresa Yushkevich, whose position is two levels higher than that of Natalia Goncharuk, confirmed that recently the district executive committee has received several appeals regarding the preservation of the inscription in Russian, citing historical facts and legislation of Belarus, as well as the preservation national-linguistic parity in society, and reported that the district executive committee had decided to leave the inscription on the graffiti unchanged.
Moreover, local authorities conducted a survey of citizens on social networks and, as one would expect, most of them also spoke in favor of the Russian-language inscription. The Belarusian language, which is also one of the state languages, will also not be infringed - Belarusian-language graffiti will appear on the city cultural center.
It would be easier for Teresa Yushkevich to support the nationalists, as many of her colleagues do. In the end, replacing the Russian-language inscription with a Belarusian one is quite in line with the trend of “soft Belarusization,” which is now gaining momentum and, perhaps, has not been officially proclaimed as state policy. And the nationalists are unlikely to lag behind the official. Moreover, they may not limit themselves to the usual slinging of mud on the Internet - they are no stranger to bombarding various authorities with the most bizarre complaints.
But, at least in one of the Belarusian regional centers, the authorities rebuffed the de-Russifiers. One can only hope that this was not just an isolated decision by an official recently appointed to her position.
Belarusian Movniuks Receive Unexpected Rebuff