Results of December IISEPS survey give us an opportunity to study the results of presidential elections 2015 from the socio-demographic and regional aspects. General results are presented in Table 1. The Central Election Commission presents official results of voting based on the turnout of voters. According to official results the turnout amounted to 87.22%. To compare official results to the results of our survey let us recalculate the official results according to the headcount.
Table 1. Results of voting in the presidential elections of 2015, %
| Variant of answer | IISEPS, 12’15 |
Official results | |
| By turnout | By headcount | ||
| A. Lukashenko | 35.6 | 83.5 | 72.8 |
| T. Korotkevich | 15.7 | 4.4 | 3.8 |
| S. Gaydukevich | 5.2 | 3.3 | 2.9 |
| N. Ulakhovich | 1.9 | 1.7 | 1.5 |
| None of the above | 8.9 | 6.3 | 5.5 |
| NA | 32.7 | 0.8* | 13.5** |
* Invalid ballot papers
** Abstention and invalid ballot papers
As you can see the difference between the results of the survey and the official results is quite significant. Taking into account the non-transparency of vote count in Belarusian electoral system, from our point of view, results of the survey are more reliable than official results. In particular, according to survey results, A. Lukashenko won twice as little votes as it was declared by the CEC.
As bar chart on Figure 1 demonstrates it, 41% of women and only 28.9% of men voted for A. Lukashenko. T. Korotkevich also earned more votes from female voters – 19.5% vs. 11%. Other contenders, on the contrary, won more votes from men than from women: S. Gaydukevich – 6.5% vs. 4.1%, N. Ulakhovich – 2.8% vs. 1.1%.
Figure 1. Voting results depending on gender (%)
If we take into account that women constitute the majority of Belarusian electorate, it is clear that A. Lukashenko’s election is mainly a decision of female part of Belarusian society.
Bar chart on Figure 2 demonstrates that A. Lukashenko won the election well ahead of his contenders in older age groups (over 40 years old). It should also be noted that he also had a significant advantage in 20-24 years old group. As for middle age groups (25-40 years old), T. Korotkevich won the majority of votes here.
Figure 2. Voting results depending on age (%)
As for education level, Figure 3 demonstrates that A. Lukashenko won in all groups. However, it is well noticeable, that the higher the level of education is the lower the share of votes for him is. And vice versa, with the growth of education level grows the popularity of T. Korotkevich.
Figure 3. Voting results depending on education (%)
Distribution of votes depending on social status of voters looks quite interesting (Figure 4). As you can see, A. Lukashenko lost the competition (insignificantly but still) in two social groups: private sector employees and students. In other groups he won the election. The biggest breakaway can be observed in the groups of retired people and public sector employees.
Figure 4. Voting results depending on social status (%)
As you can see in Figure 5, A. Lukashenko scored a victory in all the regions of the country. He earned the biggest amount of votes in Grodno, Mogilev, Vitebsk, and Brest regions. The smallest amount – in Minsk. T. Korotkevich won most of her votes among the voters of Gomel and Vitebsk region, and the least of votes were given to her in Mogilev, Minsk, and Grodno regions.
Figure 5. Voting results depending on region (%)
Figure 6 demonstrates that A. Lukashenko won majority of votes in settlements of all types. As usually, he is most popular in villages. The smallest amount of votes he won in Minsk. As for T. Korotkevich, she enjoys bigger support in cities and much smaller support in villages.
Figure 6. Voting results depending on settlement type (%)
And finally, Figure 7 demonstrates that voters with average monthly per capita income between minimal wage budget (MWB, approximately $ 90 in November) and two minimal consumer budgets (MCB, approximately $ 140 in November) gave the biggest support to A. Lukashenko. It’s interesting to note that in outermost groups (incomes below MWB or above 2 MCBs) A. Lukashenko’s support is not that considerable: electors in these groups actively supported T. Korotkevich.
Figure 7. Voting results depending on per capita income (%)
As for the other two contenders of elections 2015, their support in most of the cases didn’t exceed the margin of error, thus there is no use to study their results at all.