UCP Candidate Denied Meeting with Voters :: Charter'97 :: News

An incident, typical for the election campaign and involving the UCP candidate for the local council, occurred on February in the village of Vornyany of the Ostrovetsky district.

On that day the local school hosted an assembly of villagers, which was presided by their chairman Rouk. The local official is also running as candidate for the deputy of district council for the Vornyansky constituency #13. His contender at the race, living in the same village, Nikolai Ulasevich (United Civil Party member) also sought to attend the assembly, to which he had the full right, as any other villager.

However, at reaching the school’s doors, he was stopped by two police guards and two local officials, who told Ulasevich that they were ordered not to let inside people without official passes.

Indignant candidate demanded urgent meeting with the district police brass for which he, in a company of a law-enforcer, headed to the local authorities’ office, where they ran into Rouk and deputy head of the district executive committee Dolgovich. Despite the presence of many, the head of the collective farm denied his opponent at the ballot the right to be present at the assembly and even didn’t let him make a phone call. This incident is quite “normal” for all the elections, which take place on the Belarusian soil.