“I hate lies.”
By: Voices Belarus
Tags: Government, Protest, Prayforbelarus, Belarus

“I hate lies.”

Hrodna resident Elena in her coat with the patch on it. Photo: Elena Kovalchuk

Pensioner Elena from Grodno wasn’t interested in politics until the 2020 election. In August she learned the history of the white-red-white flag, and after Lukashenko’s claims about “fascism” she decided to make a patch of his portrait with this national symbol.

“I hate lies. Lukashenko claimed there are no photos of him with this flag. Yet, after his interview people started posting shots of him with the national symbols. I liked one of them and decided to turn it into a fabric patch for my coat.”

For several days now Elena proudly walks in the streets of Grodno in her coat with the patch. She says people walk up to her and give her the thumbs-up. She doesn’t mind being photographed. Police do not stop her.

Hrodna resident Elena in her coat with the patch on it. Photo: Elena Kovalchuk

Elena is against violence and she doesn’t like what’s going on in the country, how the Belarusian people are treated.

“Lukashenko did say that if people turn against him, he would leave, he wouldn’t clinch to power with “blue fingers”. And what is happening? So many people were convicted and battered. My son and daughter-in-law also got fined for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

What did Lukashenko say?

On November 20, Alexander Lukashenko spoke about the white-red-white flag and said that he would clean the society of the “fascist symbols”.

“It is a fascist symbol. Who submitted this question for a referendum? Your humble servant. When we had white-red-white flags that nationalists lobbied for, I was strongly against it. When I was elected the president, I immediately put it up to the referendum: here’s one symbol, here’s another — you choose the one we’ll have. The vast majority supported the current state symbols. What does that have to do with me? Besides, there are no pictures of Lukashenko with the white-red-white flags, while there were such pictures of fascists, even Hitler.”

Alexander Lukashenko during his inauguration ceremony in 1994. Photo: Sputnik / Y. Ivanov

Lukashenko added that he will not stand “these fascist symbols” in Minsk.

“We will remove fascist symbols from our society. We will do it gracefully, and we will convince people that [showing these symbols] must not be done, we will get that into their heads.”

Where did the white-red-white flag come from?

Presumably, the flag was created in 1917 as a symbol of the Belarusian national movement. It is believed that the author of the design was an architect Claudius Duzh-Dushevsky. In 1918, the white-red-white became the flag of the Belarusian People’s Republic.

For some time during the Second World War the flag was used in Belarus by organizations that cooperated with the Nazis. At the time, collaborators from numerous European countries used their national flags.

On September 19, 1991, the Supreme Council of Belarus approved the white-red-white flag as the state symbol. Alexander Lukashenko became president and took his oath in front of this flag. In 1995 he initiated a referendum on the national symbols. As a result, the state symbols that exist today were established, based on the Soviet flag and emblem.