New leader or new crackdown? Belarus has entered a new era

For a man who has spent a quarter of a century building a political brand based on stability, there is no doubt that the events unfolding in Minsk will change politics in Belarus and the standing of its veteran leader Alexander Lukashenko for ever.

What is not yet clear is whether the new political era that will follow the protests will be one of dynamic change and a new government, or one of a sustained and bloody crackdown.

“This is a country pretty much unified from border to border in outrage,” said Nigel Gould-Davies, a former British ambassador to Belarus now at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. He compared the situation to the 1989 revolutions that brought down communist regimes across Europe.

Over the years, Lukashenko has offered his people a sort of Soviet-lite system that prizes tractor production and grain harvests over innovation and political freedoms, and the key part of his political offer has always been political and economic stability.

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Lukashenko tried to push this line again into the run-up to Sunday’s presidential vote, painting Belarus as an island of stability in a world buffeted by economic crises, political unrest and coronavirus.

The scale of discontent over the past days shows that for many Belarusians, this messaging will no longer work. In order to secure his supposedly crushing victory, Lukashenko required what appears to be some of the most brazen vote-rigging in recent European history.

Belarusian authorities thought they could safely leave Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the wife of one of the opposition candidates arrested in recent months, on the ballot to provide a window dressing of democratic competition. Instead, Tikhanovskaya emerged as a formidable opponent, describing herself not as a leader, but a symbol, and promising swift new elections if she attained power.

“This sort of ‘accident’ can happen in ageing autocracies. They try to eliminate possible competitors but they look to the elites and figures that resemble themselves,” said Ekaterina Schulmann, a Russian political scientist and Chatham House associate fellow.

The contrast between the two visions of Belarus was visible in the pre-election speeches. An angry Lukashenko berating a room of grim-faced suited functionaries stood in stark contrast to the lively rallies of Tikhanovskaya. She drew crowds of thousands even in small cities, where people sang along to Changes, the 1987 song by the Soviet rock band Kino that became the soundtrack of a previous generation of people demanding a new kind of politics.

“The basic political demand is not for a woman instead of a man, or a young person instead of an old person, but for a different type of political communication and a different sort of conversation between the people and the authorities. And you can see and hear that difference very well if you listen to the speeches of the president and the oppositional leader,” said Schulmann.

The brazenness of the falsification in Sunday’s vote may prove to be counterproductive. If the official result had been Lukashenko winning with 55%, combined with a statement that he had listened to the people and would embark on a new and conciliatory era, he might have restricted anger to the usual politically active demographic.

Now, it seems to have broadened to encompass many people who have never protested before. Lukashenko’s comments that those behind the protests were “sheep who had been manipulated from abroad” will also not have helped.

“There’s a genie out of the bottle and it won’t go back in,” said Gould-Davies.

The role of Russia in what follows could be pivotal. Russia and Belarus in theory are part of a “union state”, though none of the state’s institutions ever materialised, with Lukashenko wary of his country being gobbled up by its larger neighbour.

The relationship with Moscow has frayed further this year, culminating in the bizarre arrest of 33 Russian mercenaries late last month who were accused of plotting a revolution in the country. A number of correspondents for Russian state media were among many journalists arrested and beaten by police on Sunday night.

In the event that a weakened Lukashenko survives, Russia may see an opportunity to increase control over its smaller neighbour. President Vladimir Putin will not want to see another neighbouring leader toppled by street protests, or another partial ally turn decisively toward Europe.

Inside the country, the coming days will test both the resolve of protesters and the loyalty of the repressive structures Lukashenko has built. Given the spread of protest to all corners of the country, does he have enough riot police? Will the isolated reports of some police putting down their shields in small towns become a broader phenomenon? And to what extent can Lukashenko count on the military, which has not previously been used for internal repression, to carry out his orders?

“He is dependent on his own armed bureaucracy. They are now faced with the dilemma of whether they need to heavily invest into keeping the old leader in power or whether he has become a liability and so they had better, for their own interests, get rid of him,” said Schulmann.