67-Year-Old Pensioner on Hunger Strike to Protest against Fraud at Election and Referendum

29.10.2004.

Vawkavysk pensioner Valantsina Saldatava, 67, went on hunger strike, reports www.hrodna.by
She demands to review the parliamentary election results on Vawkavyski district. Valantsina Saldatava also demands to repair her apartment which had been practically destroyed during preparation to Dazhynki, the official harvesting festival.
The 67-year-old women, suffering from pancreatic diabetes, went on hunger-strike on Wednesday, October 27. She stays in her apartment, where she lives with her granddaughter, 13. Valantsina Saldatava drinks only water.
-- Although I am ill, I visited every house on our Central Street. Everybody voted for Awtukhovich, but Navasad got the seat, -- she explains, -- When will they stop lying to people? I addressed the town authorities with the demand to re-count the votes!
The pensioner also demands from the authorities to repair her old two-room apartment, where the authorities had pulled down the stove. Before the harvesting fest the authorities promised to repair everything and build a bathroom in the house. However, her house is still in ruins. The three-meter-deep hole after the stove in her kitchen has been filled up just recently. The works on the bathroom have never been started, although the pensioner offered to partially pay for that.
-- Let they be ashamed of making me, a pensioner, go on hunger strike, says Valantsina Saldatava, -- but I will continue until they do what they promised and until they re-count the votes!

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