In the course of public opinion polls respondents were asked questions about their awareness of the campaign “Tell the truth!” and about their attitude to it the second time in succession. The campaign “Tell the truth!” started from scratch. Its initiators, judging by numerous statements of experts and party activists, possess rather serious resources by Belarusian standards; that is why the obtained results quite clearly illustrate agitation potential of the opposition, as well as the level of support of opposition ideas in the society.
The data of the polls are presented in Tables 1-2. Their interpretation, by all appearances, will depend on the level of interpreters’ involvement in the campaign organization. On the one hand, the share of citizens who answered the question “Do you know anything about the civil campaign “Tell the truth!” in the affirmative has grown almost twice for three months (from 12.5% to 23.5%).
Table 1. Dynamics of answering the question: “Do you know anything about the civil campaign “Tell the truth!”?”, %
| Variant of answer |
06’10 |
09’10 |
| Yes |
87.2 |
75.3 |
| No |
12.5 |
23.5 |
| NA |
0.3 |
1.2 |
Table 2. Dynamics of answering the question: “If your answer is “yes”, then what is your attitude towards it: positive, indifferent or negative?”, %
| Variant of answer |
06’10 |
09’10 |
| Positive |
5.1 |
10.7 |
| Indifferent |
6.9 |
11.6 |
| Negative |
0.9 |
1.7 |
| NA |
87.1 |
76.0 |
On the other hand, the share of the campaign potential supporters has not even reached 11% during the time of its promotion. In other words, among those who know something about the campaign only less than a half of respondents assess it positively.
The data of Table 3 let us estimate the socio-demographic characteristics and political preferences of those respondents who know something about the campaign “Tell the truth!” There is nothing surprising in the fact that among those who do not trust A. Lukashenko the share of well-informed citizens turned out to be two times larger than among those who do. Attention should be paid to the following: three months ago the advantage of the former over the latter constituted 1.5 times.
Table 3. Dynamics of positive answers to the question: “Do you know anything about the civil campaign “Tell the truth!”?” depending on gender, age, education and trust in the president, %
| Characteristic |
Yes (06’10) |
Yes (09’10) |
| Gender: | ||
| Male |
15.0 |
28.8 |
| Female |
10.3 |
18.9 |
| Age: | ||
| 18-29 |
14.2 |
30.8 |
| 30-39 |
14.4 |
28.0 |
| 40-49 |
13.5 |
23.7 |
| 50-59 |
12.3 |
21.2 |
| 60 and older |
9.1 |
14.1 |
| Education: | ||
| Primary |
10.6 |
9.4 |
| Incomplete secondary |
9.1 |
11.1 |
| Secondary |
11.6 |
24.8 |
| Vocational |
11.7 |
24.0 |
| Higher |
20.5 |
32.3 |
| Trust in the president: | ||
| Trust |
10.6 |
16.9 |
| Do not trust |
15.5 |
32.1 |
Dependence of propagation velocity of information about the campaign on respondents’ political preferences can also be easily explained. First of all, information sources of those who trust and do not trust A. Lukashenko do not completely coincide. Supporters of the president prefer state mass media, and organizers of the campaign could not, of course, use them. Secondly, each person singles out from the information flow chiefly those messages which correspond to his world view. It means each of us hears mainly what he or she wishes to hear.
Owing to the fact that the initiative group of the poet V. Neklyaev, leader of the campaign “Tell the truth!”, was officially registered, state mass media began a campaign to discredit him. Therefore one should expect a considerable increase in the company’s recognizability rating. However, in view of understandable reasons no similar growth of positive assessments among the well-informed citizens is going to occur.
At the same time, an increase in the share of Belarusians who treat the campaign “Tell the truth!” positively does not automatically become transformed into a desire to vote for its leader. The electoral rating of V. Neklyaev according to the open-ended question asked in September constituted only 1.1%, and according to the closed-ended one – 5.1% (with limit of the coverage error equaling 3%), although it exceeded the ratings of his opposition rivals.
Taking into account the fact that according to the IISEPS data opposition candidates received 26-27% of votes of the number of respondents at the presidential elections of 1994, 2001 and 2006, one may most probably expect a repetition of the same outcome in 2010. In this case such insignificant electoral ratings should not mislead us: maximum 30% is the approximate limit. At that, if several opposition representatives find themselves on the ballot paper, they are going to share the mentioned percentage among themselves.