Belarus opposition braces for 2025 election showdown with Lukashenko
Four years ago, presidential elections were held in Belarus, in which - according to the official version - Alexander Lukashenko was awarded 80.1% of the votes. The leader has already announced that he will seek re-election in 2025. "This will be a military operation. There can only be one winner," assesses Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the leader of the Belarusian opposition, in an interview with Interia.
On August 9, 2020, presidential elections took place in Belarus. Lukashenko won 80.1% of the votes, and his opponent, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the candidate of the democratic opposition, secured only 10.1% of the voters.
These were the official election results. The scale of electoral fraud and the number of Belarusians who actually supported Tikhanovskaya are unknown. The country saw massive protests against the election falsification.
Meanwhile, Lukashenko, ruling the country since 1994, has already announced that he will seek re-election in 2025. "I will do it. Tell them (the exiled opposition) that! The harder the situation becomes, the more actively they will act to shake our society," he announced a few months ago.
Tikhanovskaya: "This will be a military operation"
According to Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, the winner of the next presidential election in Belarus can already be predicted.
"This will be a military operation, not free elections. All the leaders who could participate are either in prison or in exile. Therefore, it will be a very sterile operation by Lukashenko's regime - no one will be able to participate in these elections, and there can only be one winner," Tikhanovskaya emphasized in an interview with Interia.
When asked about the plans of the Belarusian opposition in this situation, she stated that two scenarios are being considered.
"On the one hand, we could encourage people to go to the polls, show their determination and dissatisfaction, even though it's known that Lukashenko will rig the election results anyway. On the other hand, people could boycott these elections, show Lukashenko that they don't want him, don't accept him, show passive resistance," said the Interia interviewee, adding that no decision has been made yet on which strategy to adopt.
