BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
February 11, 2005
Lukashenko rediscovers the old Chinese methods
by Andrzej Nowojewski & Rob Avis on Friday 11th February 2005
The 3rd of December 2004 has become a historic day for millions of Ukrainians, as the date on which the 12-day Orange Revolution came to an end. Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians celebrated the restoration of their freedom in Kiev's Independence Square. This momentous event should remind us of the forthcoming anniversary of the end of the Second World War. For much of Europe, 8 May 1945 marked the beginning of more than half a century under ruthless communist dictatorship. Hundreds of millions gained a glimpse of liberty during the downfall of the USSR in the beginning of the 1990s but there are still many countries where the Cold War is far from over. We have a responsibility to them, and in particular, we have a responsibility to the tens of millions of Europeans suffering at the European Union's doorstep under an authoritarian regime in Belarus.
In the midst of the USSR's downfall in 1991 the scattered Belarusian opposition revived the thought of independence. Unfortunately, because Soviet influences were particularly strong there, emerging democratic institutions were heavily contaminated with the old communist nomenclature which was actively tampering with democratic initiatives. In that spirit the first presidential elections in 1994 were won by Alexander Lukashenko, a former communist activist who cunningly exploited mass media in advertising his vision of curing an appalling economic situation in the country. Despite his promises, once elected, Lukashenko started replacing important officers in government and administration with people loyal to him. Another worry for Lukashenko was the Belarusian constitution which imposed many serious limitations on presidential power: Parliament and High Court were the two independent institutions that were allowed to call off the president in case of a violation of the constitution and limited the time of a single presidency to two terms. Lukashenko decided to use upcoming parliamentary elections in the spring of 1995 to target these weaknesses of his power. In the course of opposition candidate Siarhiej Antonczyk's campaign, he accused the President's collaborators of misconduct and corruption. Lukashenko officially forbade publishing the allegations in mass media; editors who did not comply lost their job.
It was not long before Lukashenko forged ahead in rigging the elections. He decided to hold a referendum that would give him legitimacy for his actions and then refused any opposition candidate access to mass media. Furthermore, he started advertising voting "yes" but at the same time he publicly encouraged people to vote against all candidates, hoping that inconclusive elections would sanction his authoritarian rule. He eventually succeeded in convincing the people that he had a right to take over power, despite a constitution that clearly stated otherwise. Economic decline in the following year raised tension within society. This situation, together with a series of unpopular decisions taken solely by Lukashenko, inflamed an uprising in Belarus. Massive protests which sometimes numbered up to 40,000 people continued for several months. This was the first time that Lukashenko ordered OMON riot police to 'appease' demonstrators. As a result hundreds were arrested and many more were beaten.
In order to ease the public tension, Lukashenko organised another referendum. For the first time the people of the new Belarus witnessed centrally organised falsifications of the national vote on a huge scale. In many regions the number of votes exceeded the number of people entitled to take part in the referendum.
When a member of the Central Elections Committee protested publicly against this fraud, the President relieved him from his duties. That was enough for the people. On 17 November several members of the government including the Prime Minister Michail Czyhir resigned and the Parliament began the process of impeaching the President. Even journalists from the presidential media ceased campaigning against opposition activists and many officers of the army and police expressed their support for Parliament. It was close. Lukashenko was saved by mediators from Moscow including the Russian Prime Minister Victor Chernomyrdin, who convinced supporters of Lukashenko in Parliament and communist deputies to boycott the vote of no confidence to the President and to support the legitimacy of the referendum. The High Court found itself in a very difficult position - in order to avoid severe repercussions, its members withdrew from former announcements and continued opportunistic policy from then on.
Having successfully secured his control over administration, government, police and media, Lukashenko endeavoured to eradicate any opposition left among the people. Disappearances occurred all over Belarus involving the leader of the opposition, Juri Zacharenko, businessman Anatoly Krasowsky and journalist Dmitrij Zawadzky, to name a few.
He closed down hundreds of independent newspapers and imprisoned many journalists under a spurious accusation of "personal insult against the President of Belarus." Shortly before the elections in 2001, editor Nikola Markiewicz and journalist Pawel Mazejka from the independent newspaper Pahonia were sentenced to two and two and a half years of imprisonment respectively for trying to publish an article about links between presidential administration and disappearances of opposition activists. The article was not published. Wiktar Iwaszkiewicz suffered the same fate after publishing an article in which he accused the government of corruption.
Since the beginning of Lukashenko's questionable presidency the Western world kept criticising the autocratic regime. Elections and national referenda over the last 10 years were not officially recognised by any of the democratic countries. "17 October elections to the House of Representatives of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus fell significantly short of OSCE commitments," read an official statement from the organisation three months ago.
Human rights groups condemned the presidential administration, KGB and police officers for involvement in the disappearances of his opponents as well as for rigging the last elections. Many of them are now considered as persona non gratae and are not allowed access to most democratic countries. No more than three weeks ago Condoleezza Rice, the incoming US Secretary of State, named Belarus as an "outpost of tyranny." But the label will remain only lip-service if serious changes in US foreign policy do not follow.
The Western approach to countries like Belarus has serious shortcomings. The fact that the country is still considered by many as part of Russia is disastrous, and sadly all actions are considered in that context. In truth this argument is as wrong as saying that Calais is still a part of the British Empire or that New York is still a Dutch colony. In fact, despite persistent Russification of life by Lukashenko the national identity of Belarusians is stronger than it has ever been. As a result foreign governments must address Belarusians independently of their relations with Russia. The alternative, isolation of the regime, will only encourage Lukashenko to go to extremes in indoctrinating society. We cannot consent to that. Ignorance of the situation in Belarus in the West is in part due to a lack of media coverage of the situation.
In recent times awareness has indeed grown, but there is still a long way to go. The Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989, the Rose Revolution in Georgia in 2003 and the recent Orange Revolution in Ukraine, all show that international media can play a vital role in liberation. Belarus needs this influence. Several days ago Belarusian Business Newspaper brought to public attention the meaning of a recent amendment to the Act of Internal Armed Forces. From now on riot police are officially deprived of the right to refuse an order to shoot at demonstrators should the order be given by Alexander Lukashenko. We all know that Belarusians have an indisputable right to their own Orange Revolution. We must help to ensure that the revolution will not turn red.
Zhao Ziyang, a former Secretary-General of the Chinese Communist Party, died on 17 January without a single mention on state radio or television, and only a few lines in Chinese national newspapers. Zhao's last public act was in 1989, when he tearfully pleaded with student demonstrators to leave Tiananmen Square, anticipating the military intervention that would leave hundreds dead. Zhao's opposition to force being used to quell the demonstrations lost him his position in government, and he would spend the rest of his life under house arrest; an ignominious end for a man who helped lay the foundations for today's China, the possessor of the world's fastest growing economy.
Zhao had himself suffered violence at the hands of the state, and perhaps that is why it was he who tried, without success, to avert the bloody suppression of the Tiananmen protests. As a prominent party official in the Guangdong province during the 1950s, where he initiated agricultural reforms, Zhao was a natural target for vilification during the Cultural Revolution, and was paraded as an enemy of socialism. After rehabilitation in the 1970s however, he went on to govern China's largest province of Sichuan, where he successfully repaired the economic damage wrought by Mao's ill-fated 'Great Leap Forward'. Higher office beckoned, and he became one of the most powerful figures in the party and was Secretary-General by the time of the suppression of the demonstrations on 3 and 4 June 1989.
The China he leaves behind is an enigma in international politics, simultaneously the new frontier of the freemarket economy and a one-party Communist state where Mao and Marx are still venerated, if only in name. Zhao, along with other reformists such as Deng Xioping, did what Gorbachev failed to do in the Soviet Union: they implemented perestroika without glasnost, and have created a hybrid state where a Communist party wields absolute political power, while opening up markets to the private sector. China is now the world's fifth largest exporter with an economy growing by almost 9 percent each year.
Sixteen years after Tiananmen, it seems apt to ask how far China has come from firing on its own citizens. The reaction to Zhao's death, especially among students, has shown how the movement for political reform in China has ground to a halt. Ironically it was the death of another proreformist, Hu Yaobang, which sparked the Tiananmen Square demonstrations. Such a reaction in China now is unthinkable: politics means much less to the ordinary citizen.
China is welcomed by the global community, joining the WTO in 2001 and due to stage the Olympics in 2008, yet the suppression of the Falun Gong religious movement has been particularly brutal, while Tibet has now been occupied for over fifty years. Mostly for economic reasons, we turn a blind eye to the latter. Amnesty International estimates that the number of people detained under laws in breach of their rights to free speech and association is in the tens of thousands.
The Russian experience is enough to make one wonder whether abandoning Communism outright would be wise. Putin's Russia is not a truly free or democratic society, and standards of living have not risen dramatically. Fear of the KGB has gone, but Russia has become a haven of organised crime, ruled for over a decade by opportunistic oligarchs. Only now have Russians realised they were the victims of a colossal robbery in 1991. If not just a difficult transition to democracy, a similar situation could well arise in China if state management of the economy were to disappear along with the Communism.
Economic reforms post-Tiananmen have given China great prosperity, but also shattered founding socialist principles of the People's Republic. Poverty is a growing problem for the first time since the revolution and the economic divide in China can only widen as the free market takes hold. It was the very reforms that the Tiananmen protesters wanted that have created today's politically apathetic generation. Chinese students are more worried about finding jobs and spending than effecting political change. The government has distracted an entire population by giving them freedom as consumers but not as citizens. Individualism has defeated the collectivism that the People's Republic was founded upon. The students in Tiananmen Square were not free-market liberals - they were singing the Internationale - but instead fighting for their basic rights as individuals in shaping their collective future.
The rich have found a voice in government because they hold the key to China's continuing prosperity, and the middle classes are free to express themselves in their consumerism. Perhaps they feel no need for democracy, just as many in this country do not bother to vote. China's form of government is only truly odious when we see the way it treats people who will not have their freedoms dictated to them. Today these voices are too easily crushed to make a difference, but when China's passionate love affair with free markets inevitably sours, it is the government that will be called to account.
Whatever political direction China takes in the coming years her influence on the world will increase. A progressively democratising China acting to moderate the USA's disproportionate dominance over the world could be a good thing for all concerned, yet who is to say that the majority of the Chinese populace are any more in favour of the free market than Maoist state control? There is no doubt that if the West continues to support what is unquestionably a dictatorship, the ghosts of those who died at Tiananmen, and maybe Zhao Ziyang himself, can never be truly put to rest.
SOURCE:
http://cherwell.ospl.org/index.php?id=2574
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