Merchants of Freedom

Street vendors may succeed where international pressure has failed in Belarus, but they need support.

Belarusians have endured a decade of sham elections, a bogus plebiscite extending their president's power, and a command economy so corrupt that the World Bank ranks Belarus among the worst places to do business.

So it comes as no surprise that the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe's "Kyiv Declaration" condemns the continued repression of academic freedom, independent journalism, and opposition politics in Belarus. Issued this week, it is the latest in a heap of statements generated over the years by international organizations and rights advocates to exert pressure on Alyaksandr Lukashenka, an absolutist president who has overstayed his welcome 13 years after winning power.

The OSCE, European Union, and United States would save words and possibly get better results through more vigorous support of grass-roots movements in Belarus. Consider, for a start, the call for change that is coming from a few thousand unconventional revolutionaries: the small-time capitalists who scratch together a living in the shops and commercial markets of Minsk, Grodno, and other cities.

Anatoli Shumchanka once sold blue jeans on the streets of Minsk. Today, the businessman-turned-organizer still works the streets, selling the hope of political and economic freedom. The Perspektyva organization that he runs represents the women and men who sell inexpensive clothing and cheap household goods to Belarusians - or at least those who are not privileged to belong to the ruling echelon.

The merchants' movement symbolizes the desire for change in Belarus, a nation of 10 million that is isolated from nearly all of its European neighbors except Russia.

FREEDOM TO EARN A LIVING

Perspektyva was founded in 2003 to represent small merchants who are anxious for market and political liberalization. Merchants are dependent on imports from Russia, and Shumchanka says corruption and a state-dominated economy put a chokehold on small entrepreneurs' ability to survive. Like the Polish shipyard workers who started the Solidarity movement, the Belarusians want fair play and economic security. "For me, a businessman is a free person who is free to earn money and support anyone he wants to politically," Shumchanka told TOL.

Yet Perspektvya and its members have faced a struggle for survival. Shumchanka and his small staff organize vendors in the marketplaces because they have no access to the state-friendly media. Shumchanka says government agents have confiscated the organization's computers. Perspektyva uses a samizdat network to print simple newsletters and brochures to inform vendors. "We are working underground under the conditions of pre-revolutionary Russia," Shumchanka said, echoing conditions described by other dissidents under Lukashenka's government.

The Perspektyva leader was imprisoned twice in 2005 when thousands of merchants demonstrated against Lukashenka's plan to impose an 18-percent tax on goods imported from Russia. According to the Jamestown Foundation, an American association that promotes democracy in the former Soviet bloc, small entrepreneurs were already contributing nearly a quarter of government revenues through taxes and fees while large state enterprises accounted for less than 10 percent.

Perspektyva and its members have faced other forms of intimidation. The government has threatened to shut down the kiosk trade altogether, and the Brussels-based Office for a Democratic Belarus reports that authorities in Minsk have sought to ban marketplace vendors for sanitary reasons.

PEERING INTO THE FUTURE

Recently, the Prague-based Civic Belarus organization invited Shumchanka and 10 Belarusian merchants to visit Czech shop owners, to share ideas and experiences. "Here we came to the future," the 32-year-old Shumchanka said, saying the visit also inspired him to continue Perspektyva's struggle for change at home.

That may take time. In the absence of effective international pressure to prod Lukashenka into accepting transitional reforms, groups like Perspektyva need grass-roots support. More cross-border exchanges are a start, to help prepare for the day when Belarusians have won their freedom.

But business chambers in Europe also could use their formidable organizing capacity to pressure home governments for more direct pressure on Minsk. If capitalists of the world unite behind these Belarusian merchants, the future they caught a glimpse of in Prague may arrive more quickly.