Salihorsk independent candidate subject to negative campaigning

The staff of ideology departments at Salihorsk state enterprises was ordered to persuade the employees not to vote for the local independent candidate Aliaksandr Valabuyeu. Several employees of the town’s state-run enterprises claim they were warned about the inadmissibility of voting for the independent candidate.

At the same time, the candidacy of Aliaksandr Valabuyeu’s rival – head of local draft board Valery Zainchkouski – keeps receiving extensive advertising by Salihorsk pro-government media.

‘Never before had the activities of the draft board or the achievements of its head attracted so much attention from the press. I can only attribute this to the election campaign and the panic of the local authorities, after the situation in one out of 40 constituencies began to cross the limits of purely technical elections,’ says Andrus Tychyna, activist of the independent candidate’s campaign team.