MINSK • Dismissed by the incumbent as too fragile to run Belarus because of their gender, three women have joined forces to try to unseat President Alexander Lukashenko, a man the United States once called Europe's last dictator.
Mr Lukashenko, who has ruled the country for over a quarter of a century, has tried to snuff out rare and sustained protests against him ahead of a presidential election next month, jailing rivals and arresting dissenters.
He faces his biggest challenge in years due to frustration over his hands-off handling of the coronavirus pandemic and grievances over the economy and human rights.
With his male challengers either barred from running or in prison, two of the challengers' wives and a female campaign team member of another have united to try to beat him in the Aug 9 election.
Ms Svetlana Tikhanouskaya, whose husband, Syarhei, spent time in solitary confinement, has become the surprise leading challenger to Mr Lukashenko, a 65-year-old former Soviet collective farm boss.
Ms Tikhanouskaya launched her candidacy after her husband, a popular blogger who campaigned against Mr Lukashenko, was arrested in May on what she says were trumped-up charges.
Mr Lukashenko is expected to extend his grip on power despite the challenge. Western observers do not judge elections in the country to be free and fair.
As a candidate, Ms Tikhanouskaya's first priority is to free all political prisoners and rerun the elections to include all candidates who were barred from standing. By Sunday, she was standing on stage having amassed the largest opposition election rally Belarus has seen in decades.
The people of Belarus "do not want to live in misery any more, they want to live in a free country where they do not grab people in the street, put them into a police van and then send them to jail for an invented reason", she said.
Her challenge is being supported by two other women - Ms Maria Kolesnikova, a member of the campaign team for Mr Viktor Babariko, who was detained and accused of financial misdeeds, and Ms Veronika Tsepkalo, wife of Mr Valery Tsepkalo, a former ambassador to the US who was barred from standing after the central election commission disallowed some of the signatures he needed to collect to become a candidate.
An image of the three women posing for the camera - Ms Tikhanouskaya clenching her fist, Ms Kolesnikova making a heart sign, and Ms Tsepkalo making a "V" for victory sign - has spread quickly. They attend events together, and people ask them for selfies in the street, sparking jokes that they resemble a female rock band.
Mr Lukashenko has said he respects women but that "society is not mature enough to vote for a woman".
The burden of the presidency would cause her to "collapse, poor thing", he said.
After receiving an anonymous threat that her children would be taken away if she pressed on with her campaign, Ms Tikhanouskaya has sent them abroad to an undisclosed location.
REUTERS
