Lukashenka In Trouble On All Fronts

The situation at MAZ reflects the complete devastation of the economy.

The Minsk Automobile Plant (MAZ) was included in the sanctions list back in June 2021. More than once, attempts were made to circumvent these sanctions by conducting fraud with the Ukrainian “daughters” of the enterprise, such as MAZ-Ukraine, which was registered on May 19, 2010 in Kyiv. The essence of the bypass was that instead of MAZ, the founders included Minsk Plant of Automatic Lines named after Pyotr Masherau (99% of shares), and Zhodzina OJSC Blacksmithing Plant of Heavy Forgings (1% of shares), which is part of the Belavtomaz holding together with MAZ itself, but does not fall into the sanctions list.

This completely changed the circumstances of work under the sanctions and, accordingly, made it possible to participate in tenders for the supply of vehicles, which were carried out at the expense of the state and local budgets. According to Ukrainian law, a company must necessarily indicate whether it is subject to international sanctions. The old bypass scheme could have worked and helped the Lukashists somehow make ends meet, but February 24 has come.

After Lukashenka provided Russia with a foothold for the attack, Ukraine started curtailing all cooperation with Belarusian enterprises. Already in May 2022, the Economic Security Bureau of Ukraine arrested a batch of 158 vehicles and special equipment worth $8 million. By becoming an accomplice in the war, Lukashenka lost his last loophole to the world market.

In general, MAZ is a rather interesting enterprise for the assembly of Chinese vehicles. Last year, on the Machine Builder's Day, the joint venture MAZ and MAZ-Weichai LLC solemnly presented the “new” truck MAZ-365120 (4x2).

But the Belarusian novelty, like many predecessors, has become nothing more than a clone of the Chinese Shacman Delong K3000, they just changed the plate. The experience is far from new: earlier in Brest, they began to “produce” Chinese JAC Sunray light-duty trucks, reincarnated into MAZ-365022 all-metal vans and MAZ-281040 minibuses.

And this year, a Belarusian enterprise created a real Frankenstein monster from various spare parts, passing it off as its own development. MAZ low-floor buses, presented for the City Day in Vitsebsk, are built according to the scheme identical to trucks. For example, the Mercedes OM 926 LA engine was replaced by a Weichai WP7, the ZF hydro mechanical automatic transmission was replaced by Fast Gear. The German ZF front axle has been replaced with a slightly modified Belarusian one, and the rear portal axle has been replaced with a Chinese Hande Axle. In fact, Belarusian factories are simply responsible for renaming Chinese products, which are sold under the guise of domestic ones.

However, the advertisement of buses, which was shown on the City Day, does not reflect the real situation in the country. While the Lukashists are rejoicing over another replacement of the sticker on Chinese vehicles, there is not enough rolling stock in Mazyr to fully meet the needs of the population in passenger transportation, and the fleet is turning into a cemetery of dead vehicles. The share of rolling stock, which has completely exhausted its resources, is 80%.

Dictator Lukashenka has really got into trouble on all fronts. He perfectly understands the situation in the country. 28 years of idle talk have led to the complete ruin of the once promising enterprises and forced them only to imitate the development of new products, which, under sanctions, will be difficult to sell, even despite the reduction in cost by replacing German parts with Chinese ones.

Artsiom Chernikau, exclusively for the Basta!«Баста!» Telegram channel