Belarus presidential elections scheduled for early 2011

The terms were set on 20 October as President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko met with Lidia Yermoshina, Chair of Belarus’ Central Commission for Elections and National Referendums.

According to the press service of the Belarusian head of state, Alexander Lukashenko decided that the two election campaigns will be held independently. In his opinion, presidential elections should not be combined with any other election campaign in order to avoid devaluating the essence of the former.

“Some people say that we should save money and combine the two political campaigns, namely the elections to local councils and the presidential elections. Yes, we would save some money but we would be criticized for holding presidential elections in an alleged chaos. They would blame the president all the same,” underlined Alexander Lukashenko.

The Belarusian head of state believes that the merger of the two election campaigns would create some chaos and difficulties only for the people, who would have a hard time sorting out ballot papers. Apart from that, there is no economic expediency. “If we held combined elections, we would gain little economic or financial benefits but we would put into question the presidential elections. This is why I believe we should separate these political campaigns. A large gap should be left for preparations for the presidential elections. That is the elections to the councils should be held first followed by presidential elections,” he said.