I have covered many elections.
I have seen the prime ministers and the presidents come to the polling stations, they show their votes and then answer some questions from journalists.
But I never saw anything similar to the scene at the 478th polling station in Minsk.
The leader of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, who has ruled the country for a long time, and who was once called the “last dictator in Europe”, arrived to cast his voice. Then, while the Belarusians were still voting, the candidate Lukashenko held a four -hour press conference on the air on government television.
This was an opportunity to interrogate him about the controversial vote that his critics condemned and described it as “false”.
“What is the miserable question I prepared for me?” He asked. “You always do.”
I answered: “Good morning.”
“Good morning Steve.”
“How can you call this democratic elections while your main competitors are either in prison or in exile?” He asked. I asked.
“Some are in prison, and some are in exile. But you are here!” Lukashenko said.
“Everyone has the right to choose. This is democracy. Some have chosen prison and others chose exile. We have not forced anyone to leave the country.”
In fact, it was the brutal crackdown launched by the authorities on the demonstrators after the 2020 presidential elections that led to the prisoner Alexander Lukashenko or pushing them to political exile. Personal choice was not included in it.
I reminded him, saying: “I recently said:” We should not close people's mouths “(silence people).”
“But your competitors have not been removed from the polls only. Some of them were imprisoned. There are currently more than 1,200 political prisoners in Belarus. Didn't time to open the prison cells and their release?
Lukashenko sighed: “Keep talking about Maria for me. Oh my God.”
“Well, I will answer your question … imprisonment for people who have opened their mouths a lot and who violated the law. Do you not have prisons in Britain and America?”
He continued: “In any country, if you violate the law, you must bear the consequences.” “The law is strict but it is the law. I did not invent it. You have to abide by it.”
I interrupted him, saying, “You have to abide by the law.” “But these people are in prison to criticize you.”
“Ignorance of the law does not relieve you of responsibility before it.”
Although prominent opposition figures were not allowed to run, Alexander Lukashenko was not the only one on the polling card. There were four other candidates. But they seemed to be more spoilers than they were serious competitors.
I told Lukashenko: “We have talked to some other candidates.” “One of them, the leader of the Communist Party, supports you publicly. And another praises you a lot. They are strange elections, right, with opponents like this …”
“Steve, this is a completely new experience for you!” He answered amid the laughter and applause of local journalists in the room.
I said: “This is true.” “I haven't seen elections like this before.”
“The policy of justice -based Communists is the same policy that we are promoting,” Lukashenko said. “Why do they vote against me?”
The European Union's foreign policy coordinator, Kaja Calas, described the presidential elections in Belarus as a “flagrant insult to democracy.”
Alexander Lukashenko does not seem to be interested in that.
He told me: “I swear to you that I do not care, whether you recognize our elections or not. The most important thing for me is that the Belarus people recognize them.”
