Belarus: Thousands Storm Government in Protest of Election

By Douglas V. Gibbs

As the nations of Western Europe experience riots over austerity measures for their failing progressive socialist government systems, in Belarus to the east thousands of protesters stormed a government building over what they considered to be a rigged presidential election that kept authoritarian leader Alexander Lukashenko in office.

Dozens of protesters were injured in the clashes with law enforcement, leaving the protest site one of bruised and bloody people who had been beaten with clubs. The number of protesters is estimated at 40,000, making it the largest opposition rally since mass street protests against Lukashenko in 1996.

The protesters are gone now, but the evidence of their presence during the evening remained evident, as they left behind broken windows and glass doors of the government building they had attempted to storm. The government building houses the Central Election Commission. Lukashenko was clear that he would not tolerate rioting, and that any protesters would be dispersed by force. He stood by his promise.

According to the protesters, the event was a peaceful assembly until the authorities showed up and used force to disperse the people.

The leading opposition candidate Vladimir Neklyayev was beaten by riot police while leading a few hundred of his supporters to the demonstration and was taken by ambulance to a hospital.

Another opposition candidate, Vitaly Rymashevsky, was beaten in clashes with riot police by the government building. He stated that the people attempting to storm the building were police acting as demonstrators and that he was attacked when he tried to stop them.

The demonstrators shouted "leave" to Lukashenko, who has been a heavy-handed leader of Belarus since 1994. His regime is often characterized as the last dictatorship in Europe.

With a win, Lukashenko is set to serve a fourth term. His tyrannical reign is evidence of the importance of term limits. Unrestricted terms more often than not leads to tyranny.

Protesters say that Lukashenko is a dictator who has created a police state in Belarus. Lukashenko maintains a quasi-Soviet state in the country of 10 million, controlling a nationalized media, and does whatever he can to stifle any dissent. About 80 percent of the industry in Belarus is under state control. The nation's relationship with Russia has been strengthening of late, but Lukashenko has also been flirting with the European Union as well.

Western nations have historically criticized Lukashenko's regime, his years of human rights abuses, and the manner of his oppressive governmental system.

Nine other candidates opposed Lukashenko in this election. If the opposition had worked together, forming an alliance under only one opposition party, the vote would have been more clearly against Lukashenko. Too many opposition opponents spread the vote around, splitting the votes that may have electorally overthrown Lukashenko in a clear manner. Because of the numerous candidates, none of them gained half of the votes needed to win the first round.

Lukashenko's big government control, and Belarus' various problems economically, provides more evidence of the dangers of a centralized governmental system, and how liberalism not only fails wherever it is tried, but how progressivism is doomed to become a tyranny wherever it is given a foothold as the dominant political ideology.

-- Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary

Thousands try to storm govt building in Belarus - Associated Press/Yahoo News