The last time the Belarusses voted in a presidential election in August 2020, an unprecedented fervor had taken hold of the country. For the first time since the coming to power of Alexandre Loukachenko, in 1994, they saw the hope of a change with the candidacy of Svetlana Tsikhanovskaïa, who had replaced her husband on the foot, blogger Sergei Tsikhanovski, imprisoned during The campaign.
Winner of a rigged ballot, the autocrat is still in power four and a half years later. The tens of thousands of demonstrators in the summer of 2020, descended in the streets to denounce the fraud, were brutally repressed. The political opposition has been imprisoned or forced on exile, civil society has been crushed, and terror has become the rule in this former Soviet Republic nine million inhabitants. The repression was further strengthened after the invasion of Ukraine by Russia, on February 24, 2022, which led to Belarus, a key ally of Moscow, in Cobelligerance.
In that Dark context The Belarusses are again called upon to participate in a presidential election on Sunday, January 26. Alexandre Loukachenko, 70, is seeking a seventh term against four candidates who all support his regime publicly. The ballot will take place in the absence of international observers of the organization for security and cooperation in Europe. His outcome is no doubt. He should grant a new victory to the authoritarian leader, who owes his political survival to Vladimir Putin.
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