State-owned newspaper accuses political parties of passiveness

The regional newspaper "Vitebskiye Vesti" summed up the forming of the territorial election commissions and told the readers that "the activity of political parties is barely visible", as far as “just 17 members of parties became members of the commissions, including 13 members of the , as party members, including 13 members of the Communist Party of Belarus”.

The newspaper did not consider it necessary to explain that the parties nominated more people to the commissions, which weren't included in them. For instance, just 3 of 48 members of the party Belarusian Popular Front were included in the election commissions in Minsk, Vitsebsk and Brest regions. While forming the election commissions, the local authorities didn't satisfy the wish of the deputy head of the regional branch of the BPF Kastus Smolikau to become a member of Visebsk Regional Election Commission. In Navapolatsk and Orsha the district election commissions also were formed without including members of the opposition.

The biased approach to the formation of the commissions is witnessed by the statistics – according to the official data, 1,790 people, or 98.5% of all nominees, were included in the territorial commissions of Vitsebsk region.

Human rights defenders, representing the Belarusian Helsinki Committee weren't included in the commissions either. However, the list of the top organizations providing members for the territorial election commissions speaks for itself:

the Belarusian Federation of Trade Unions of Belarus (359 people, more than 20% of the total number);
Belarusian public association of veterans (101, 5.6%);
Belarusian Union of Women (87, 4.9%);
Belarusian Republican Youth Union (70 people, 3.9%);

Republican public association “Belaya Rus” (61, 3.4%).