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SIDEWALK DEMOCRACY

The talks about possibility or even imminence of colored revolution in Belarus are very popular among supporters of the opposition. A. Lukashenko’s opponents are convinced that the results of the forthcoming election will be falsified and therefore they will have to stand up victory (if any) in street actions of protest. Can the Ukrainian scenario take place in Belarus? What resources does the opposition have nowadays?

According to Table 1, a half of respondents think that many or all people feel scared to express their political viewpoints, 20.6% – that no one feels scared and 22.2% – “few feel scared.” Considering distribution of answers to this question as depending on the type of settlement, Minsk stands on the top among “the most brave” (30.5%) which is quite expected. Unexpectedly, region centers and not villages are the first in the answers “all feel scared” (24.1%) and “many feel scared” (42%). Popularity of the latest answer is high in all types of settlement.

Table 1. Distribution of answers to the question “What do you think about readiness of people in Belarus to express their political standpoints?”

Variant of answer

%

No one feels scared to express his/her political viewpoints

20.6

Few people feel scared

22.2

Many people feel scared

37.1

All are scared

13.5

DA

6.1

Hierarchy of fear and courage goes the next in the frame of regions. The greatest number of “all are scared” answers has been registered in the Vitebsk (17.2%) and Grodno (16.9%) regions and of “many are scared” answers – in the Brest (46.8%), Grodno (46.3%) and Gomel (45.2%) regions. Minsk and Minsk region are the first in the “courage” indicator. Here, 35.4% and 30.5% respondents respectively answered “no one feels scared.” The most answers “few feel scared” were received in Minsk (28.7%) and Gomel (27.4%) regions.

For a while, we shall not comment on the question on political standpoints of those who don’t have any fear as well as on what “many” and “few” is in the opinion of respondents. We should like to make a remark though that the group of those who don’t feel scared is a minority and this points out to topicality of the OSCE demand on overcoming the atmosphere of fear and improving the political climate in Belarus.

What are the protest moods in such a climate? When asked “Are you ready to participate in street action of protest if the results of the presidential election are falsified?”, 15.5% of respondents answered in the positive, 76% – in the negative and 8.2% found it difficult to answer. At first sight, this is a high degree of protest moods since 15.5% out of 7 million voters is over 1 million people. Yet, how seriously did people say about their readiness to join the street actions? Will the opposition bodies be able to organize and coordinate the protests of such scale? We’ll try to find answers to these questions based on the data which shows attitude to actions of the authorities on obstruction of meetings on delegate nomination for the Congress of Democratic Forces. That was a purely opposition forum and therefore answers to the question should reveal the degree of compassion to the political opposition and in particular to its confrontation with the authorities. (See Table 2).

Table 2. Attitude to actions of the authorities on obstruction of meetings on delegate nomination for the Congress of Democratic Forces

Variant of answer

%

I support these actions of the authorities

11.8

I don’t support such actions of the authorities

34.8

I’m not concerned about this

34.7

DA/NA

18.5

One can see that such actions of the authorities weren’t supported. On the other hand, it is wrong to talk about nation-wide support of the Congress. Over half of respondents said they “are not concerned about this” or found it difficult to answer. This means that prevailing is the group which is not interested in political infighting and is not willing to take any side in this conflict.

Let’s see how attitude to the Congress depends on respondents’ understanding of the political climate in Belarus. (See Table 3.)

Table 3. Attitude to actions of the authorities on obstruction of meetings on delegate nomination for the Congress of Democratic Forces depending on the answers to the question on people’s readiness to express their political standpoints*, %

Attitude to the actions of the authorities which hampered holding of the Congress of ]Democratic Forces

Assessment of people’s readiness to express their political standpoints

None feel scared

Few feel scared

Many feel scared

All feel scared

DA

I support these actions of the authorities

39.5

29.4

21.8

3.0

4.6

I don’t support such actions of the authorities

7.2

19.0

49.0

23.1

1.4

I’m not concerned about this

28.8

26.1

30.5

9.0

5.5

DA

18.9

16.6

37.0

10.1

17.1

* Table is read across

The data shows that dominating in the group supporting the authorities are those who don’t feel atmosphere of fear. Mirror-like is the situation among the respondents discontented with the authorities. Most of them think that many people or all people are afraid to express their political standpoints.

Among the respondents who said that they are “not concerned about this”, there are some who are satisfied with the political climate as well as some who feel fear. The majority is those who are satisfied. It can be assumed that these people mainly support the policy of the authorities or incline to supporting it. At the same time, pretty large is the group of those respondents who assess the political climate in Belarus in the negative. Their distance from the “satisfied” group makes only 10 points. Why did the actions of the authorities against the opposition forum left them neutral? We suggest that unawareness about its holding to a great extent influenced answers of respondents. Thus, 89.4% of those who said “I’m not concerned about this” didn’t hear anything about the Congress. Quite possibly, the neutral would be fewer and Congress supporters would be more if respondents had heard about the Congress, its goals and objectives as well as about actions of the authorities to frustrate the opposition forum.

Another important group is those respondents who found it difficult to assess actions of the authorities against the Congress. This is mainly the choice of those who feel fear in Belarus. They concealed their attitude which is reasonable of them, but actually they didn’t support actions of the authorities.

We should like to consider now how awareness about opposition forum influenced attitude of respondents towards this forum and towards impeding actions of the authorities. Only 20.6% of respondents said they heard about holding of the Congress while overwhelming majority – 74.7% – heard not. Remarkably, only 15.3% of those respondents who knew about the Congress didn’t participate in delegate nomination and didn’t know personally the people who participated in the nomination process. Among the respondents who knew about the Congress, dominating number (66%) does not support the authorities. (See Table 4).

Table 4. Attitude to actions of the authorities on obstruction of meetings on delegate nomination for the Congress of Democratic Forces depending on the answers to the question if respondents knew about holding of the Congress of Democratic Forces*, %

Did you know about holding of the Congress of Democratic Forces?

Attitude to the actions of the authorities which hampered the meetings on delegate nomination for the Congress of Democratic Forces

I support these actions of the authorities

I don’t support such actions of the authorities

I’m not concerned about this

Yes, I did

12.0

66.0

11.4

No, I didn’t

11.6

27.2

41.6

* Table is read across

There’s yet another side of this coin. As regards readiness to express opposition viewpoints, only 7.2% of the respondents who didn’t support the actions of authorities against the forum say that “no one is afraid to express his/her political viewpoints.” This is twofold less than the number of respondents ready to participate in street actions of protest if the presidential election is rigged. This is as well 2.5-fold less than the number of respondents who placed themselves among oppositionists and is close to the number of respondents ready to take part in a colored revolution in Belarus. It encourages that 19% of respondents who said “few people feel fear” didn’t conceal their negative attitude to actions of authorities, but didn’t they place themselves among those few? Where do they draw a line between “many” and “few”?

It is obvious that the data on readiness to stand up political interests in the street should be taken very carefully and possibility of the opposition to organize such actions should also be carefully assessed.

Except the problem of fear elimination, there’s an issue of future campaign’s information support within the shortest terms. It is for about six months that they talked about preparation and holding of the Congress of Democratic Forces. The Belarusian opposition doesn’t have access to the state-monopolized mass media and the state propaganda machine concealed information about the forum and only defamed its organizers at the very last preparation stage. Therefore, it is no wonder that less than a quarter of respondents knew about the forum and that this political conflict left neutral over half of respondents.

As they say, they oil better that wheel which creaks the most. Attitude of respondents to the opposition forum reveals complexity of communication between A. Lukashenko’s opponents and the publicity in the peaceful time. How then will information exchange be carried during the election campaign or in case of a colored revolution?

The example of the Congress shows that a half of people involved into nomination of delegates for the forum, knowing them personally or aware about the Congress have nothing to do with the opposition. It is every fifth oppositionist only who was involved in the process. This means that A. Lukashenko’s opponents failed to use fully their own bodies not only in the process of a sole candidate nomination (which was a basic goal of the Congress) but also for spreading information among their supporters. Leaders of the official opposition should be alarmed with the fact that 9.7% of those respondents who placed themselves among A. Lukashenko’s opponents remained neutral to impeding actions of the authorities prior to the Congress.

It is noteworthy that the number of those who place themselves among opposition and those who met and talked to members of political parties over lately is approximately the same – 17%. It can be assumed that this percentage is an indicator of politically active population involved in this or that way into activity of political parties. There’s no similarity between those who class themselves as oppositionists and those who met with party representatives (over a half of respondents who met with party members don’t place themselves among opposition). Meanwhile, exactly a half of respondents said that they would like to know more about the Belarusian opposition – political parties and other organizations, their leaders and political programs. This is almost threefold more than the number of oppositionists proper and of those who talked to party members over lately. Since the degree of interest exceeds its present-day satisfaction, this means there is a potential for growth.