Belarus Presidential Election: Who is competing with Lakashnko, does it make any difference? , Election news

The Belarus residents are voting in the presidential election on Sunday as President Alexander Luxhen wants the seventh mandate to rule.

For the past 30 years, 70 -year -old Lakshhenko, called the “last dictator of Europe” by many analysts, has strictly ruled the country, crushing all the protests and voices against him.

The President, who has not joined any election campaign this time, told the factory staff last week, “I do not follow it honestly. I do not have time for this. “

But after the last election in 2020, when the leader was declared the winner despite a report of comprehensive public outfits against him, mass protests began on a large scale. The opposition and the West claimed that their victory was fraud and the candidate was stolen from Swiatlana Tsikhanoskaya, who was forced to flee the country.

Now, while his political opponents have either been imprisoned or exiled, their success on Sunday is believed to be almost fixed.

The election was initially planned in August but was shifted to the deep winter. One reason was, Belarusian political analyst Balri Carbalevich suggested the Associated Press: “There will be no massive protests in the January cold.”

Here you need to know about the election:

When do the ballots open?

Voting began across the country at 8 am (05:00 GMT) and will be open till 8:00 GMT).

Belarus works on a simple majority system, where citizens vote for the head and legislature of the state every five years.

Belarus residents above 18 years of age will be able to participate.

The election results are expected to come by 5 February, and the second round will be on 12 February if necessary.

How many people are expected to vote?

State news agency Belta said on Friday that after three days of early voting, voting was 27.15 percent.

Belta reported last week that 1,500 people were interviewed in a referendum survey held in December, 85.5 percent registered voters indicated that they would vote in the upcoming election.

According to the platform statistics that collects data, about 84 percent of eligible voters voted in the presidential election in August 2020.

It states that the capital Minsk recorded the lowest “more than 66 percent polling”.

However, foreign Belarus residents will be able to participate in the elections only by returning to the country and voting at the regional polling station.

Who is running against Lakhakheko?

According to the Central Election Commission (CEC) of the country, four candidates have been registered to participate in the Sunday election.

Oleg Gedukevich, president of Liberal Democrats, announced that he was contesting in October and told First News Channel that “healthy competition should be discussed”.

Sergei Sirankov, the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, will also be in voting.

Former Parliament member Anna Kanpatasakaya, who last contested in the 2020 presidential election, will run and Republican Labor Party President Alexander Khiznyak is the last candidate.

However, Belarusian educationist Tatsiana Chulitskaya at the University of Sexyas, Lithuania, told the Reuters News Agency that the four candidates had not criticized Lakashnco during their campaign.

“These are not candidates in the general sense of this word. They are just playing in this campaign. They are not competing with Lakashnco, ”he said in a phone interview.

What happened in 2020?

After the August election, the CEC announced that Lakshhenko had been re -elected and secured 80.1 percent of the votes, ensuring his victory over opposition candidate Tsikhanoskaya.

However, the allegations of voters fraud spread like a forest fire when some people argued that the counting of polling stations was not equal to the official count of the CEC, causing opposition groups and Western governments to accuse Lakshkanko of stealing elections.

Due to the election results, a large -scale peaceful mass protests began in Minsk, asking Lakashnco to step down.

But the protesters faced intensive police action and large -scale arrests, the Belarusian human rights group Viasna reported this week that more than 3,270 people have been convicted for joining the 2020 protests.

In addition, the group found that there are more than 1,200 political prisoners in the country. Lakshhenko released 23 political prisoners last week, which the state media referred to as a human signal, apparently had time to match the last days before the election.

Has there been any response to the election?

Tsikhanoskaya called for rejecting the “illegal” election on X from West.

He told BBC News that the election is a “pretense”, he further said, “This is a military-style operation; it is a military-style operation.” A demonstration done by the government to maintain power. ”

But Tsikhanoskaya told the Belarusis not to protest like the last election, he said, “You have to be safe till the real moment of possibility.”

At the same time, the European Parliament adopted a resolution on Wednesday to reject the election results.

A statement by the European Parliament said, “Repeating his position of not recognizing Shri Lakashnco as President and considering the entire Belarusian rule illegal, MEP is unwavering to unwavering his unwavering people in search of democracy, freedom and human rights. Express support. ” Reading.

Last week, former US Secretary of State Antony Blinkan said that “in an environment where the censorship is omnipresent and independent media outlets are no longer present” elections cannot be independent or fair.

He said that the US condemned the Efforts of the Belarusian government to make the election “legitimate”.