On December 6th, 1991, Belarus and 14 other independent states emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Belarus hosted its first presidential election in 1994, where 39-year old Aleksandr Lukashenko won with 45.8% of the votes in the first round and 80.6% of the votes in the second round. The populist rose to fame for his determination to tackle government corruption and rising inflation that originated from economic reforms being implemented by Prime Minister Kebich. Yet, this election would soon be known as Belarus’s only democratic election. Lukashenko merely consolidated power for himself via a rigged referendum election that gave him the constitutional powers to rule over Europe’s last dictatorship to this day. Despite receiving attention from international observers for its rigged presidential elections and violence towards political opposition, Belarus has recently garnered global attention for leaving thousands of immigrants stranded at the borders of its neighboring countries. With many speculating that Lukashenko manufactured this crisis , this article identifies Lukashenko’s biggest problems in maintaining his political stronghold and their role in motivating Lukashenko to engineer this major crisis.
Problem #1: The Government’s Weak COVID-19 Strategy. The effects of dictatorship were apparent when observing how disparate the state’s COVID-19 response was compared to the rest of the European Union. Lockdown measures were lax, and a flimsy mask mandate was not enforced until October 2021, and further perpetuated with President Lukashenko openly stating that he would not be vaccinated. Lukashenko, drawing parallels to former president Trump, was the source of a large deal of misinformation regarding COVID-19, as seen through his absurd claims that driving tractors or driving vodka would protect against the virus. Even after contracting COVID himself, he denied the severity of the pandemic. Furthermore, Belarus did not offer vaccines approved by the European Union, only offering three major vaccines: Sputnik V (from Russia), Sputnik Lite (Belarus’s single-dose version of Sputnik V), and Vero Cell (from China). Yet, many Belarusians wished that they had access to “western” vaccines, such as Pfizer. Specifically looking at voters between the ages of 18 and 34, over 50% believed that Lukashenko made a grave mistake in his decision to not implement restrictions in response to COVID-19. As he clearly loses youth allegiance, Lukashenko has become dependent on elderly voters, however, a 2020 protest led by 3000 retirees suggests that this strategy is also quickly crumbling.
Problem #2: Political Violence Leading Up to the 2020 Presidential Elections. Lukashenko was elected as a man of the people. But many of his statements and actions, especially in recent years, have been blatantly opposite of the character personality he first presented to voters back in 1994. In the 2020 elections, due to the aforementioned struggles with public opinion, Lukashenko openly barred and imprisoned his male challengers, many of whom attempted to start a new opposition party. However, he did not attempt to bar women from running for office, claiming that he was unthreatened since “society is not mature enough to vote for a woman” and that the burden of the presidency would cause her to “collapse, poor thing”. Three women declared their presidential candidacies, two of whom were wives of barred candidates and a third, Maria Kolesnikova, who was a campaign staffer for the imprisoned, and favored, opposition candidate Viktor Babariko. In September 2020, Kolesnikova was kidnapped by masked police who attempted to exile her to Ukraine- she tore up her passport and ever since, she has been imprisoned for 11 years for “extremism”. The other two female candidates were also exiled to Ukraine. Given Lukashenko’s stronghold, protests are uncommon in Belarus, however, his re-election sparked weeks of protests with over 70% of surveyed Belarusians understanding that this election was a “sham”. Overall trust in Lukashenko’s government has disintegrated with the change in voter attitudes.
Problem #3: Intensifying Problems with the European Union. Lukashenko’s decision to defy public opinion in the 2020 elections in broad daylight cost him public support and resulted in heavy sanctions by the European Union. The EU refuses to recognize the results of the August 2020 elections and has “progressively imposed restrictive measures against Belarus” as of October 2020, including sanctions on 183 individuals and 26 entities who have been responsible for repression and intimidation. In June 2021, they further banned Belarus aircraft carriers from accessing EU airspace and airports. Later that same month, Belarus exited the Eastern Partnership, an initiative by the EU to strengthen their relations with six post-Soviet states within its region. However, some believe that sanctions are ineffective since many high state officials in Belarus lack assets abroad and do not travel extensively and because sanctions have not been consistently used as a tool to isolate Belarus into compliance. Experts suggest three methods for the EU to strengthen these sanctions as a policy tool: 1) include entire families of targeted individuals in the sanctions, 2) include lower-level administrative officials who help run general elections and 3) expand the international coalition of actors imposing sanctions to include post-Soviet allies and banks like the IMF that continue to give aid to Belarus. These sanctions are concerning not only because 84% of citizens have a positive or neutral image of the EU, with 45% claiming to trust the EU, but also due to the economic impacts that could further taint Lukashenko’s support. The United States also imposed sanctions after Belarus was accused of orchestrating the migrant crisis in EU countries. Due to these recent changes, the true economic impacts are unclear given that there have been mixed trends thus far: positively, larger export volumes and foreign trade has helped the economy grow by 2.7% between January and September 2021, but inflation has grown at a significantly higher rate than the growth of income. There is significant economic uncertainty for Belarus in the next few years, especially if economic integration with Russia ceases, which will likely reflect negatively on Lukashenko.
Lukashenko claims that he can only be removed from power through assassination, and with a signed decree that martial law will prevail following his death, only time can tell whether sanctions, political pluralism, and public distrust can catalyze Aleksandr Lukashenko’s downfall and the reintroduction of democracy in Belarus.
