Authorities disrupt final exams for young oppositionists

05.06.2008. Тэгі: Young Front, expulsion, Shyla.
Крыніца: Хартыя'97.

The head of the educational department of Frunzenski district executive committee of Minsk prohibited an activist of the Young Front Alena Makarevich to pass her exam in the Belarusian language. ‘I think it has been done in order to prevent me from entering a university’, Alena Makarevich said to RFE/RL.

‘This year I finish school. I haven’t been allowed to pass Belarusian. I was told to come in August,’ the girl said. ‘They motivated it by the fact that I was late for the exam. The school and the commission of monitoring gave permission to me. But the head of the educational department of Frunzenski district executive committee of Minsk Tastiana Zakharonak prohibited me to sit for an exam. She said: ‘You will pass the exam in August’. Teachers were crying. They had been fighting for me to receive permission. They had been ordered not to allow me to take the exams. And they allowed me, and took it in the neck for that. And now I am withdrawn from the last exam…’ Alena Makarevich said.

She said that she was shocked when learnt about the situation with Ivan. ‘They want to draft him to the army probably’, the girl said. ‘Once I was threatened to be expelled from the school. My mother was threatened and summoned to the KGB several times. Father was told at his work that the labor contract won’t be prolonged. And the deputy schoolmaster on ideology work in school reads all oppositional websites, following the interviews, and then summons for ‘conversations’. Once in an interview I told that 99% of pupils are BRSM (pro-governmental youth organization) members in our school. She even thanked me for that, as it was a bonus for her,’ Alena Makarevich said.

Recently the educational department of Salihorsk town executive committee has adopted an illegal decision to expel one of the leaders of Salihorsk branch of the Young Front Ivan Shyla from secondary school # ‘for his active public work’, though the administration of the school was against it.

Headmaster Volha Siankova retired in protest. Her assistant was dismissed for ‘unsatisfactory educational work’. After that teachers unanimously voted to expel Ivan Shyla from the school. It happened before the final exam in English. In order to prevent the boy from attending the exam a police guard was sent to the school.