Elections: Most candidates seek to register nomination groups on deadline d

The majority of potential contenders are set to file their registration applications on the last day of the procedure -- September 24. Haidukevich has the largest nomination group with over 10,000 people. Ramanchuk has the smallest with around 800. It is yet to be known how many people are in Sannikov's group.

The deadline for presidential candidates to register their nomination groups is September 24. So far, only Victor Tereshchenko has registered. The European Radio for Belarus has learned that Uladzimir Nyaklyaeu and Yaraslau Ramanchuk would file their registration documents on September 23.

According to Ramanchuk, they will arrive at the office of Central Elections Commission in the afternoon on Thursday. "We are collecting all the documents and will walk singing and dancing to get registered in the afternoon on Thursday".



Yaraslau Ramanchuk, United Civil Party's deputy chairman, has a small group of 800 people. Their list is made both in Russian and Belarusia. He says these are just official data. "They are the people who will 100 percent busy collecting signatures. There is yet another group we are not talking about. Those people will gather signatures, but will not be part of the group due to formalities. Therefore, if counted, there will be much more people. However, we are submitting only the names of those on the list for registration", says Ramanchuk.

He claims he had no problems to gather his nomination group. The politician doesn't mind either if his group members will be also gathering signatures for another candidate. He expects them to work efficiently.

Tell the Truth! campaign leader Uladzimir Nyaklyaeu will also file his bilingual lists to Central Elections Commission one day before deadline. His group lists over 2000 people. Nyaklyaeu said he had no problem with manning his nomination group. "We have planning meetings every day and we have had no problems with signature collection", he said.



Popular Front party deputy chairman Ryhor Kostuseu will submit his documents on the last day of registration. The lists and applications are in Belarusian. He says there was only one problem when manning his group: to convince party members that Kostuseu is not a no-win candidate.



Kostuseu did not set a condition that party members should work only for the Popular Front candidate. But, invitations to Popular Front members to work for another candidate never stopped. "Statkevich has already started calling many regions. I know that there were phone calls to the Vitsebsk region and Mahilyou region. Sannikov's people and Nyaklyaeu's people are also calling. I think some might be bought by their offers. But, I reckon there will be few such people", said Kostuseu.

The aforementioned politicians said they did not take any steps to buy out supporters from other candidates. But, they reckon that if someone gathers sigantures for several candidates, there is nothing wrong with it. This is the freedom pof choice.

By the way, Andrei Sannikov has declined to reveal the number of his promotion group members. He has not mentioned the date when he would proceed to Central Elections Commission, either. He just added that he had no problems with manning his nomination group.



Mikalai Statkevich has not revealed the number of people in his nomination group, either. But, he will file the lists -- bilingual as well -- on September 24.



Belarusian Christian Democracy co-chairman Vital Rymasheuski will also register his 1000-strong nomination group on the same day. He noted that if there were two-three months of leeway, he would have gathered 3000 people in his group. All of them will collect signatures only for Rymasheuski. "We have given recommendations to all members of our nomination groups not to collect signatures for any other candidate. We will definitely monitor this situation and will try to counteract such actions", he said.




Ales Mikhalevich plans to visit CEC on September 23. However, since not all the regions have submitted the lists of nomination groups, the visit to CEC might be postponed for September 24. The list contains over 1000 people. The application was written in Belarusian, while the lists will be in two languages: Belarusian and Russian.




But, Liberal Democratic Party leader Sergei Haidukevich has the largest group of 10443 people. He plans to collect 100,000 signatures daily. He feels disgusted to think that his activists would also work for another candidate.

He is likely to have his group registered on September 24. The lists will be filed in two state languages. Haidukevich stressed that his party members respect the mother toungue.

Photo by: Zmitser Lukashuk