Belarus holds its presidential election on December 19, 2010. The term is for 7 years. Ten candidates qualified for the ballot, despite the harsh ballot access law that requires 100,000 signatures. See this story. Belarus has a population of 9,850,000, and is one of the few nations of the world that has imitated the United States by requiring hundreds of thousands of signatures for presidential candidates to appear on the ballot.
The incumbent president, Alexander Lukashenko, is running for re-election. He has held the presidency since 1994. Thanks to Bill Van Allen for the link.
The number of candidates is surprising in two ways, one yes for its ballot access laws, but the other for the potential violence that they could face. Belarus is not the most free country in the world by any means.
And because it’s not free those other nine candidates have virtually no access to media for campaigning purposes, while the incumbent president gets air time daily. No one knows who the opposition candidates are, which makes it difficult to give the people a choice. Lukashenko will win this election by a landslide too, even if no one shows up at the polls to vote. The website for one of the opposition candidates http://charter97.org/ has it’s servers located in the United States, which is how they manage to stay on the internet.
B land was part of the EVIL temporary zombie dead U.S.S.R. — amazing that ANY body survived World War II in the area – Hitler attacks with Stalin counterattacks.
What sayeth Bible Fans about the 7 year terms and half of such terms — 3.5 years = 42 months ???
Plurality winners ???
Runoff elections ???
Let’s not forget that some states in America have ballot access laws that are equal for Democrats, Republicans, and third parties. And in several cases this year the third parties voluntarily chose not to compete. Can’t blame restrictive ballot access laws there, can we? Maybe laziness on the part of third party activists. I know, it’s not politically correct to say something like this on this website, but it needs to be said.
# 4 What magic States have equal ballot access requirements for ALL candidates for the same office in the same area ???
The State of Utopia ???
Good question Demo Rep. I would know the answer to this.
Correction: I would like to know the answer to this.
#7 Perhaps for dogcatcher in a super-rural township in a super-rural State ???
For any *power* office, an UNEQUAL story of course.