Belarus, Ukraine and Svetka one percent

Everything is bad with sociology in Belarus. Any kind of objective independent ceased to exist a long time ago, and during the 2020 election campaign, which was accompanied by a campaign of fake polls “Sasha 3%”, the screws were tightened to the limit, banning even online media from conducting political opinion polls. As for official sociology, it should be perceived only as a component of the state propaganda machine.

In this situation, polls from the British Chatham House, which have been regularly published since the fall of 2020, have attracted much attention. It is clear that there are questions about both the representativeness of the surveys and the non-partisanship of the organizers. They survey only the urban population and only on the Internet, and the director of the “Belarusian Initiative” at Chatham House, Grigory Astapenya, a sociologist close to the opposition, is responsible for them. However, it's still better than nothing, and on data Chatham Even pro-government media do not hesitate to refer to House. Yesterday the data of the next, eighth survey were published. As you might guess, it was dedicated to the most pressing topic - the military conflict in Ukraine and the attitude of Belarusians towards it.

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The survey results are mixed. Most Belarusian citizens are interested in the events taking place in Ukraine. Only 18 percent remained indifferent. Those who remain prefer to receive information about the progress of the conflict from various sources. Priority among these sources is given to Belarusian non-state media (22%), Belarusian state media (20%), Russian state media (18%). Russian non-state media and Ukrainian media scored 12 and 11 percent respectively.

The unpopularity of the Ukrainian media, unfortunately, is not an indicator. The fact is that the audience of Belarusian non-state media in their views almost identical to the Ukrainian audience. These people believe that Belarus is participating in military operations against Russia and at the same time believe in the victory of Ukraine. In turn, the views of the Russian media audience are close to the views of those who trust the Belarusian state media. The positions of these two sides are often diametrically opposed and, unfortunately, we have to admit that the conflict in Ukraine split Belarusian society even deeper.

Of greatest interest are the answers to the question of what Belarus should have done after the start of a military special operation by the Russian army in Ukraine. The most popular answer is to support Russia’s actions, but not to enter into a military conflict (28%), The second most popular is to declare complete neutrality and withdraw all foreign troops (25%). The following are:

Condemn Russia's actions, but not interfere in the conflict (15%)

Support Ukraine's actions, but not enter into a military conflict (4%)

Take part in hostilities on the side of Russia (3%)

Condemn the actions of Ukraine, but not enter into a military conflict (2%)

Take part in hostilities on the side of Ukraine (1%).

As we can see, if we believe this survey, Belarusians are frightened by military operations near their borders, they support Russia to a greater extent than Ukraine, and they themselves categorically do not want to fight. In principle, this fits into the official ideology: we, Belarusians, are peaceful people, the concept of a donor of peace and stability in the region, the idea of ​​Belarusian peacekeeping in Ukraine, which Lukashenko has repeatedly advocated.

In principle, such sentiments opened a window of opportunity for the opposition. Taking advantage of Belarus' traditional fear of war and the utopian but attractive idea of ​​Belarusian neutrality, it could now gain many supporters into its ranks. However, with its own Russophobia and dependence on the West, the Belarusian opposition slammed this window of opportunity.

_{After the start of the conflict, Tikhanovskaya and almost the entire “fugitive” opposition took the most radical and most unpromising position. She not only supported the Ukrainian side, but also began forming groups of Belarusian militants to send to Ukraine, collecting intelligence data for the Ukrainian special services about the locations of Russian troops and even organizing a “rail war” on the territory of Belarus itself.}

Thus, already now the Belarusian pro-Western opposition, with the forces available to it, is taking part in military operations on the side of Ukraine. Let us remind you that even according to the data of the far from pro-Russian Chatham House, only one percent of Belarusians support such a policy.

It turns out that Tikhanovskaya, who received 2020 percent of the votes in the 10 presidential elections according to official data, and more than 50 percent according to her supporters, with its extremism it has now driven itself into a one-percent electoral ghetto.

 _{If the meme “Sasha 3%”, promoted a couple of years ago by political strategists, was just a meme, then “Sveta 1%” is the objective state of the pro-Western opposition, which, under the influence of Western curators, has finally become detached from its people.}