Political Analyst: “Many Constitutional Amendments Are Being Made with the Possibility That Someone Else May Become President in Mind”

The day before, at a meeting with members of the constitutional commission (https://ex-press.by/post/lukashenko-o-plane-oppozicii-oni-uzhe-gotovyatsya-/181400/), Lukashenka again spoke about his successor and that person’s role in the state system.

Filin (https://ex-press.by/category/filin/) collected political analysts’ views on what goal Lukashenka is pursuing each time he raises the topic of a new president.
— These are far from his first such reflections, notes political analyst Valery Karbalevich. He talks about this constantly when the new Constitution is discussed.

Lukashenka is thus explaining why the All-Belarusian People’s Assembly needs constitutional status.

And the All-Belarusian People’s Assembly needs this status in order to control the future president.

Lukashenka wants to head the All-Belarusian People’s Assembly or some of its governing body and control the activity of the new leader so that he is obedient and acts within the framework that Lukashenka himself considers correct.

The question is when this will happen.

We need to see what the transitional articles of the Constitution will be, when it enters into force, and whether there will be early presidential elections. All this is more important than the referendum and the new Basic Law.

Political analyst Andrei Kazakevich believes that in this case the topic of a successor was raised because political reform and constitutional reform are among the mechanisms for ensuring a transfer of power:
— Many of the announced changes are being made precisely with the possibility in mind that someone else may become president.

If we recall, after the start of the political crisis, the discussion about constitutional reform itself took place precisely within this framework.

There is an understanding even within the authorities that Lukashenka is not eternal, that he can no longer resolve many issues, and therefore it is necessary to think somehow about reformatting the political field.

This will make it possible to change power.

We do not know when this will happen, and I think they do not know either.

But the reform itself was conceived for this purpose: to invent new mechanisms for controlling the situation.

Perhaps sometime in the autumn of 2020 someone hoped that such a reform could genuinely calm society to some extent.

That the transformations would actually mean some political changes.

Accordingly, the system would become more open, because society’s main demand was precisely democratization.

But it is obvious that in the format in which this is being done now, the reforms will in no way be a response to Belarusian society’s demands.

Rather, the Constitution will limit ordinary people’s ability to determine who is in power.

In addition, it must be understood that the Basic Law was prepared within administrative procedures and took into account the opinion of only one political group, the group currently in power.

There was no internal dialogue to make the reforms acceptable to the people.

Nor were there, for example, discussions with opposition organizations.

And the referendum itself is taking place amid repression against civil society structures, activists, and the media.

And, of course, under such conditions it is impossible to say that the reform is being carried out in response to society’s demands.

Source (https://ex-press.by/rubrics/politika/2021/11/26/politolog-mnogie-izmeneniya-v-konstituciyu-delayutsya-s-uchetom-chto-prezidentom-mozhet-byt-kto-to-drugoj)