Media Challenge in Belarus
Outside the department store Gum in the centre of Minsk people are collecting names for presidential candidates. Photo: Agneta Söderberg
On December 19th the Belarusian people are to vote on who’s going to run their country the next four years. No one doubts that the current president will retain his post for another term. Alexander Lukashenko has ruled Belarus since 1994. In 2004 a referendum was held which eliminated presidential term limits and allowed him to stand for the presidency again and again. Lukashenko won the last election, in 2006, by a landslide, getting 82,6 % of the votes, but the election was widely condemned by international observers.
Many are asking why the Belarusians vote for Lukashenko. Why do they want to keep a president who does not respect citizens' human rights? One answer to the question may be that the Belarusian media is tightly controlled by the state. The freedom of operation for the few remaining independent media is cropped in many different ways, while the dominant state-supported media report almost exclusively pro Lukashenko.
What is it like to work as an independent journalist in this kind of climate? In the weeks leading up to elections, we will publish a series of articles by Belarusian journalists about the reality they live and work in. We will also publish other material, like monitoring reports of how the Belarusian media cover the election. To read the articles, click on the headlines in the column to the left.