Translated material
Lukashenko completed the vertical of power
Alexander Lukashenko has built a model of power in which no one and nothing prevents him from harmoniously combining completely pragmatic political practice with unbridled reactivity of reactions. Since 1996, when he changed the constitution for the first time, it seemed that he was about to finally break his neck. But each time he came out of trouble stronger and stronger, and the eyes of the opposition faded more and more noticeably, and one September night in 2001, the illusions dissipated: the results of the presidential election were summed up. Those around Lukashenko understood that the patron’s rating was balancing at 50%, the opposition was hungry for the second round and was expecting a deception of 5-7%. And Lukashenko said: 75, giving the opposition a measly 13%, and they realized that they would never beat him according to such rules.
And now Lukashenko has put an end to it. “Everything is just beginning,” the leader of the liberal United Civil Party, Anatoly Lebedko, tried to cheer up as usual, and Stanislav Shushkevich interrupted him with an unusual frown: “No, Anatoly, I don’t agree with you...”
No one had any more illusions, although the ratings were again against Lukashenko, and an honest exit poll was expected only as a factor of moral satisfaction, and hands were given up. Lukashenko's regime has stabilized in full.
There is economic growth - and this is true, although not 10-15%, but even the most staunch opponents of the regime do not deny that it is at the level of 3-5%. The answer to this growth is simple, it’s still our same 50 dollars per barrel, and there is no need to modernize not only the Novopolotsk and Mozyr oil plants (exports of petroleum products are growing anyway), but even tractor factories, MAZ and other masterpieces of the social industry that have made us happy with their orders unpretentious Russians.
The vertical of power, which Lukashenko was the first to come up with and which he was the first to learn to talk about without hesitation, has been completed to its logical conclusion. Nothing threatens the completed vertical, no matter how much the opposition reads into the lines of the American Act on Democracy in Belarus. In fact, everyone, especially the Americans themselves, understand that they have no leverage over Minsk, and presenting their attitude towards Lukashenko as a new version of their attitude towards Milosevic turns out to be unconvincing: they are not interested in Belarus. Europe is not interested in it either. There is only one country in the world that could somehow influence the situation, but this country does not go beyond threatening to turn off the gas tap. But in Minsk they know very well that this cannot be done for more than a couple of days for technological reasons, and secondly, Moscow is generally not inclined to make sharp decisions, and even with obvious personal antipathy it is easier for it to endure than to change something .
It's not about gas - after all, even after raising the gas price to $42 per thousand cubic meters, Lukashenko sells gas to domestic consumers for $80, which means there are reserves. And not in the opposition, which Moscow, for obvious reasons, does not help - at the moments of peak drops in Lukashenko’s rating, the indicators of the oppositionists still do not exceed the level of statistical error. “What could be a signal for the flight of the nomenklatura?” - I asked people who know first-hand about the mood within the vertical of power. The vertical, of course, is unshakable, but people at its different levels are nervous: the anger and suspicion of the patron can fall on anyone at any moment. “Such a signal,” they answered me, “could be a mass exit of people onto the streets, but for now this is excluded. Another option is an unambiguous word from Moscow, and not half-hearted hints, but clearly: they say, it’s time, Alexander Grigorievich...” But this is not expected here either, especially since everyone remembers the story with Mikhail Marinich.
The former mayor of Minsk, the former minister of foreign economic relations, the former ambassador to Lithuania and Finland - flesh and blood of the Belarusian nomenklatura. Experienced and cautious, in 2001 Marynich decided to oppose the president by standing as a candidate for the elections. At that time, he did not particularly advertise his support for Moscow, which tried to carefully experiment on the theme of nomenklatura rebellion. But then he went all-in, and Lukashenko, of course, knew very well in which high Moscow offices Marinich was received. But when he was imprisoned this summer on a ridiculous pretext, Moscow took no steps to free him. This became the main signal of the Belarusian vertical: there will be no other signals.
And no one, like in 2001, asks how the dad will survive economically and whether he will still have to part with some controlling stakes. You won't have to. Nobody believes in the opposition - it is uninteresting, because the main achievement of the vertical of power is the complete alienation of power from society, a kind of social contract with the division of powers: power rules. Without bearing any responsibility. For this, society is given some opportunity to live without paying any attention to the authorities. So that it doesn’t get worse, and if it gets worse, it won’t be by much. One tractor driver from the state farm, which was once headed by Lukashenko, remembers everything about him, even remembers that his nickname was Fuhrer, but he voted for Dad forever in the referendum. "Why?" - “So where else is there anything against...”
But the authorities, which seem to be in no danger, are still nervous. Maybe because he knows: if such regimes collapse for unaccounted reasons, they collapse suddenly, without warning and overnight. That’s why it’s hard to understand why rallies are dispersed on even days of the week, but left alone on odd days.