MOSCOW—When Svetlana Tikhanovskaya walked into Belarus’s election commission to complain she had been cheated out of a win in last weekend’s presidential election, her campaign team expected her to quickly emerge to carry on the fight.
Instead, she disappeared, resurfacing the next day in Lithuania. In a video posted on social media, she called for her supporters to end their protests and accept the incumbent, Alexander Lukashenko, as their president.
To his critics, it was a glaring example of how Mr. Lukashenko controls the political system in Belarus, the former Soviet republic he has run since the fall of the Iron Curtain. For years, the 65-year-old longtime Moscow ally has appointed judges and key leaders of the security services and state media. He handpicked the leader of the election commission, who has been in the role since 1996. Among his most feared tools is the country’s secret policy, which still carries its old Soviet-era name, the State Security Committee, or KGB.
Protesters and police clashed during demonstrations Aug. 9, the day of the elections.
Photo: Misha Friedman/Getty ImagesBut as protests and strikes spread over his handling of the Aug. 9 election, in which Mr. Lukashenko claimed 80% of the vote, the edifice he created is under threat.
On Sunday, tens of thousands of people gathered in Minsk for an eighth consecutive day, chanting at Mr. Lukashenko to “go away” and waving an opposition flag. Across town, a rival rally that the interior ministry said grew to more than 65,000 gathered in support of Mr. Lukashenko.
What happens in Belarus, a country of just under 10 million people, could determine the next steps in a long and frequently testy struggle for influence between the West and Moscow in Eastern Europe, right on Russia’s western border.
On Friday, Ms. Tikhanovskaya, 37, appeared to distance herself from the video, calling for more demonstrations and urging her supporters to sign an online petition for a recount of the election.
Mr. Lukashenko’s government quickly cracked down on protests, detaining almost 7,000 people. Though the government has since released thousands and the interior minister issued a public apology, the president has been unwilling to back down and accused other countries of plotting his downfall. He talked to Russian President Vladimir Putin on both Saturday and Sunday about how to strengthen ties to Moscow.
“This is a threat not only to Belarus,” he said before their Saturday phone call. “I want to say that the protection of Belarus today is no less than the protection of our entire space.”
Russia on Sunday “reaffirmed its readiness to provide the necessary assistance in resolving the problems that have arisen” in Belarus, based on the countries’ mutual cooperation treaties that include providing help under a mutual military pact, the Kremlin said in a statement.
Mr. Lukashenko appealed to his supporters at the government-backed rally, saying they needed to protect their country from chaos.
Supporters of Mr. Lukashenko waved Belarusian flags as they rallied in Minsk’s Independence Square on Sunday.
Photo: Sergei Grits/Associated Press
Protesters rallied Sunday at Minsk’s Hero City Obelisk.
Photo: Natalia Fedosenko/TASS/Zuma Press“Do not push people to a violent confrontation,” state news agency, Belta, cited him as saying. “Do not dishonor a country—peaceful, prosperous and calm, which everyone in the world envied,” he said.
The European Union has been critical of the election and is considering sanctions on individuals aligned with the government, as a show of support for the Belarusian opposition.
“These people have the same rights as every other European nation: right to freedom, to dignity, to democracy,” Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said in an email. “We must stand by their side, take a strong stand and don’t allow the Belarusian government to get away with an electoral fraud. Elections must be repeated, free and fair, in a transparent way, with international observers allowed.“
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday said Washington and Brussels should work together to stop Belarus slipping further into Russia’s sphere of influence if Mr. Lukashenko remains in power.
Belarusians say they are worried about what Russia might be planning given its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014 following a civil uprising that brought down the then Moscow-backed Ukrainian president.
“Nobody knows how the Kremlin will react in case Lukashenko is overthrown,” said Maxim Samorukov, a fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center, a think tank. “It is highly unlikely that the Kremlin will just sit back and watch the transfer of power in Belarus. Russia may be interested in annexing the country altogether.”
For years, Mr. Lukashenko played the role of “Batka,” or father, of the Belarusian nation. His supporters credit the one-time farm boss with securing the stability and independence of the country following the demise of the Soviet Union. With a penchant for uniforms and ice hockey—he still plays regularly—he projected himself as a symbol for the entire nation, at times strengthening ties with Russia and, at others, building bridges to Europe.
In his earlier years, he spoke energetically against corruption before becoming president in 1994.
“This is how he became popular,” opposition politician Alexander Dabravolski recalled. “Mr. Lukashenko offered society a concept of justice based on the envy of the rich, whose cottages he promised to confiscate.”
Police raided an opposition candidate's apartment in 2004, seizing campaign materials ahead of elections that critics said were biased in favor of Mr. Lukashenko’s supporters.
Photo: Sergei Grits/Associated PressBut by the early 2000s, the euphoria began to fade. Mr. Lukeshenko began using referendums to bypass parliament, and changed the constitution to remove term limits, allowing himself to stay in power indefinitely. Mr. Lukashenko appeared to revel in his reputation as a strongman, too.
“An authoritarian style of rule is characteristic of me and I have always admitted it,” he told a news conference in 2003.
But the system he built, dominated by political appointees and state-owned enterprises, was ill-suited to the demands of the modern, global economy. By 2010, real incomes had started to decline and young people felt their ambitions were being smothered and began to push for change at the top. Mr. Lukashenko pushed back, blocking opposition candidates that year and again in 2015.
The turning point came earlier this year, with the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic.
Mr. Lukashenko dismissed the virus as a psychosis, and suggested treating it with saunas and shots of vodka. Belarus, which has recorded over 69,000 infections, kept its borders open and didn’t issue any quarantine or social-distancing orders. Soccer fans around the world tuned in to watch the Belarusian league, one of few still running. Mr. Lukashenko also instructed schools to remain open.
A woman voted in last weekend’s elections amid concerns about the effect of coronavirus on older people.
Photo: yauhen yerchak/EPA/Shutterstock“He didn’t hide the fact that many old people would die and this would not be bad for the budget,” said Andrei Sannikov, who challenged Mr. Lukashenko for the presidency in 2010 and now lives in Warsaw. “He even crossed this red line: he started to accuse people, that it was their fault they were dying. People were simply shocked.”
Businesses struggled, especially the retail sector, as consumption declined.
A move by Russia, Belarus’s main trading partner, to close its borders to stem the spread of the virus added to the economic pain, but the government didn’t do anything to help small businesses survive.
As the August election approached, several candidates made plans to challenge Mr. Lukashenko, including a banker, a former ambassador to the U.S., and Sergei Tikhanovsky, a popular YouTuber and Ms. Tikhanovskaya’s husband.
Mr. Lukashenko managed to fend them off. The banker was detained on charges of financial wrongdoing, which his supporters say were falsified. The former ambassador was disqualified and then left the country in fear that he would be arrested, too. Mr. Tikhanovsky was detained in May for allegedly inciting social unrest.
Then Ms. Tikhanovskaya, a newcomer who previously focused on raising her two children, stepped into the ring. She attracted tens of thousands of people to her rallies, vowing to reset Belarus’s political system if she won and open the way for new, fairer elections.
Presidential candidate Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, voting Aug. 9, vowed to open the way for new, fairer elections if she won.
Photo: Misha Friedman/Getty ImagesWhen election day came on Aug. 9, exit polls indicated that Mr. Lukashenko had swept the ballot again. Tens of thousands of people poured into the streets to protest what they said was a sham election. Riot police beat them back, sometimes brutally.
A day later, Ms. Tikhanovskaya entered the election commission to file her complaint—the last time she was seen in Belarus. The head of the commission confirmed that the video in which Ms. Tikhanovskaya was filmed calling on her followers to stand down occurred in her office.
Instead of quelling the protests, Ms. Tikhanovskaya’s video emboldened them. At least two people were killed. Strikes emerged at some of the country’s largest state-owned enterprises, temporarily halting production at some.
Ms. Tikhanovskaya has said she has evidence, including copies of documents from some polling stations, proving that if the ballots were honestly counted, she would have won up to 70% of the vote.
“Belarusians will never again want to live with the old authorities,” he said in her Friday video message. “Let’s defend our choice. Don’t stay on the sidelines. Our voices need to be heard.”
Belarusian President Lukashenko addressed his supporters during a rally in Minsk on Sunday.
Photo: yauhen yerchak/EPA/Shutterstock—William Mauldin in Vienna and Drew Hinshaw in Warsaw contributed to this article.
Write to Ann M. Simmons at ann.simmons@wsj.com
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