‘We have enough of him’. Queues in Minsk to support Lukashenka’s rivals (photos)

On May 31, our crew was covering pre-election pickets in Minsk all day long. Have a look at the photos we have picked out for you.

The Belarusian Central Election Commission (CEC) have registered 15 of 55 initiative groups. It means that over a dozen wannabe got the green light for collecting signatures to be nominated for the 2020 presidential run. There are both establishment and moderate opposition politicians among them.

To officially become a presidential candidate, each of them will have to collect 100,000 signatures until June, 19. The names of the candidates will be announced in mid July, and the election will be held on August, 9.

Notably, a wannabe presidential candidate does not have to get permission from the authorities for holding such a pre-election picket.

This year’s presidential campaign is indicative of the people’s fatigue with the 26-year rule of Alyaksandr Lukashenka. On Sunday, thousands of people throughout the country lined up to put their signatures for any of his rivals. Especially large queues formed after blogger Syarhei Tsikhanouski, a trustee and husband of Svyatlana Tsikhanouskaya, had been detained in Hrodna on May, 29.