Supreme Court turns down lawsuit of Belarusian Party of Workers against Ministry of Justice
As said to the BelaPAN by the leader of the organizing committee of the Belarusian Party of Workers Aliaksandr Bukhvostau, on 15 December the Supreme Court of Belarus didn’t grant the lawsuit of the party concerning its’ non-registration by the Ministry of Justice.
’The verdict was quite predictable’, said Bukhvostau. ‘In fact, all our tactics of work with the Ministry of Justice was near miss. We refused to submit the additional documents that we believed were unnecessary for registering the party.’
Aliaksandr Bukhvostau admitted that the organizing committee made certain mistakes. In particular, according to the Belarusian legislation, not only the name of a new party must differ from the name of an earlier liquidated one, but the abbreviation as well.
On the other hand, the politician said that ‘the court decision was influenced by actions of traitors’. ’15 people from Mahiliou oblast refused from their signatures for founding of the party. I don’t know whether it was inspired from the outside or they just took offence at the administration of the organizing committee,’ commented Aliaksandr Bukhvostau.
He also stated that the work of the organizing committee would continue: ‘At the trial we proved that we had enough people to register a party. Maybe we will hold another constituent assembly next year.’
The information on non-registration of the BPW was placed at the official web-site of the Ministry of Justice on 20 October. The official reasons are: the actual number of founders was less than the legally established number sufficient for registration of a party; there were numerous violations during the nomination of delegates to the constituent assembly; the list of the founders contains inaccurate information.
The latest constituent assembly of the BPW took place on 26 July in Minsk. The party was established on the basis of the Belarusian Labor Party that had been liquidated by the Supreme Court in 2004 on the initiative of the Ministry of Justice that accused the party of systematic violations of the Civil Code, the law on political parties and its own charter. Mr. Bukhvostau believes that the party was liquidated on the political order of the authorities.
At present Belaya Rus’ is a pro-governmental organization somewhat similar to the Communist Party in the USSR. At present there are 15 officially registered political parties in Belarus. Earlier there were 18 parties, but three of them were liquidated: the Women’s Party Nadzeya, the Ecological Green Party and the Belarusian Labor Party.
