80% districts have one candidate

People boycott the local council “election”.

Almost 80% of electoral districts will have only one candidate. Alternative candidates won't be election to local councils, human rights activist Valiantsin Stefanovich says about the campaign.

He notes that he sees no signs of the electoral campaign. It looks more like a virtual one, Radio Racyja reports.

“As an ordinary citizen I'd like to say the election campaign is invisible. If I were not involved in the process, I wouldn't know we have the 'election'. The 'election' will be held, local council members will be elected, but alternative candidates won't win the poll,” he said.

The initiative “Human Rights Activists for Free Elections” sums up that the process of checking signatures for candidates was closed. There are suspicions that the process of proposing and registration of candidates was controlled by the authorities.

An average electoral district in Belarus has 1.2 candidates in the local council election. Rural councils are less popular among candidates, while big cities have more contestants.