The Die Is Thrown

It is the change of power that the vast majority of Belarusian citizens demand.

It seems that in our disputes about whether to take part or not we have missed the remarkable fact that the elections have already taken place.

Real elections, without the intervention of ready-to-die Yarmoshyna.

The former "electorate" joined the people, and all of them voted together, supporting with their votes both active protest and the cabinet-internet politics. In fact, this choice covers almost all voters in the country.

Supporting the alternative, people unmistakably identified the loser and provided him with a deadly accurate label "Sasha 3 Percent".

The voters have already voted, demonstrating large-scale participation, discipline and readiness to act both in the streets and the online polls on different platforms.

Lukashenka took the most active part in this voting at the final stage. Having forbidden Internet polls, he thus approved his 3% share, making this figure, which is quite high for him, his official rating.

It took off from there: having organized a provocation against the Homel blogger and given an illegal order to arrest him, Lukashenka publicly confessed that he had taken a thrashing at the "elections" he himself had initiated.

He used to imprison his opponents after the election, but this time he lost his nerve already at the stage of collecting signatures.

Having arrested Siarhei Tsikhanouski and imprisoned Mikalai Statkevich, Lukashenka again revealed his panic fear of even the perfectly peaceful street.

Having conceded in his complete failure, Lukashenka exacerbated the political situation in the country.

Whereas in the past we were thinking about how to defend our choice after the "elections," at the moment we have to defend it today, now.

It is necessary to achieve by any means the release of Siarhei Tsikhanouski and all the activists illegally arrested and detained. And then there should be no dividing into supporters or opponents of this or that alternative candidate. Moreover, there should be no dividing into "them" and "us". The choice of the people that all Belarusians and the whole world have seen over the past week is to be defended.

How can it be done?

Sometimes it is necessary to listen to Lukashenka. He lies all the time and everywhere, but when he is shaken by fear, he speaks frankly about what and who he really fears.

So this time he outlined his fears: street protests, alternative leaders, bloggers, independent media, public opinion. And the greatest danger for him is the people who have nothing but hatred towards him.

Lukashenka understands perfectly well that this is about the change of power and acts on the basis of this understanding, trying to hold on to it.

It is the change of power that the vast majority of Belarusian citizens are demanding.

It’s a fallacy to assume that Yarmoshyna will leave the half-cooked borscht in the ritual services office, confess to falsifications and exclude Lukashenka from the list of candidates. Do not expect that the votes will be miraculously counted and laid at the feet of "non-lukashenka".

The choice has already been made, and it must be protected.

Andrei Sannikov, Facebook