Belarusian referendum, 1995

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The May 14, 1995 Belarus Referendum required the population of Belarus to vote on four issues:

The state status of the Russian language
Economic integration with Russia
The introduction of new national symbols
The President's right to dismiss the Parliament, if the latter violates the Constitution

The first three issues were described as "posted by President of Belarus for the obligatory referendum"; the fourth was described as "posted by President of Belarus for the purposes of a consultative decision."

The date of the referendum coincided with the date of the elections to the Parliament. On April 11, 1995, the Parliament considered the questions for the referendum, approved the date, but approved only the question regarding economic integration with Russia. Alexander Lukashenko declared that he would not change his decision and would accept personal responsibility for the referendum, and left the Parliament, announcing that it would be his last talk to that composition of the Parliament.

A number of opposition delegates decided to carry out a hunger strike within the Parliament building. They were forcibly removed by OMON. The parliamentarians sued the militsiya for battery.

A conciliatory commission was called upon to resolve the conflict of President vs. Parliament about the referendum, which was eventually decided in the President's favor.

The voter turnout was 4,823,482 citizens or 64.8% of the total electorate (7,445,820)^[1]. All four proposals were announced as passed. Of three questions, the one relating to national symbols turned out to be the most controversial.

1 Russian language status
2 Integration with Russia
3 State symbols
4 Parliament dismissal
5 References

[edit] Russian language status

Question: "Do you agree with assigning the Russian language the status equal to that of the Belarusian language?"

83.3% voted for, 12.7 voted against, the remaining bulletins were declared invalid.

[edit] Integration with Russia

Question: "Do you support the actions of President aimed at economical integration with Russia?"

83.3% voted for, 12.5 voted against, the remaining bulletins were declared invalid.

[edit] State symbols

Question: "Do you support the suggestion about the introduction of the new State flag and State Coat of Arms of the Republic of Belarus?"

The new symbols were approved by a ratio of three to one (75.1% for, 9,93% against, the rest declared invalid) of the participants.

The decrees about the new state flag and new coat of arms were signed by President on July 7, 1995.

Opposition raised a number of concerns regarding the referendum. First, the referendum was preceded by a heavy campaign in media (which is overwhelmingly state-owned) that stressed the fact that the then current emblem was used by Nazi collaborators (Belarusian Central Rada) during the Great Patriotic War. For example, the first leader of the post-Soviet Belarus, Stanislav Shushkevich in his interview mentioned that Pahonya was called "fascist symbolics" ^[2] What is more, even before the final announcement of the results of the referendum, Lukashenko's Chief of Administration Ivan Titenkov personally hoisted down the old flag from the Palace of Government and shredded it in public.[1]

Second, the referendum question was formulated in a vague way: a number of people claimed to vote in the belief that "new" are the new ones introduced in 1992, i.e., Pahonya and white-red-white flag.

Still another cause for concern has been the number of voters who approved the symbols. In reality, only 48.6% of the total electorate approved of the new emblem, since over a third of the eligible voters did not express an opinion. Some claim that this failure to win a majority is a violation of the Constitution, but the imperfection and incompleteness of the Belarusian Law cannot resolve the issue (in particular, the Constitution does not define the acceptance threshold).

Alexander Lukashenko had tried to hold a similar referendum before, in 1993, but failed to get parliamentary support. Two months before the May 1995 referendum, Lukashenko proposed a flag design that consisted of two small bars of green and one wide bar of red. While it is not known what became of this suggestion, new designs (called "projects" in Belarus) were suggested a few days later, which were then put up to vote in the 1995 referendum. ^[3]

Coat of arms

Lukashenko's proposed flag

Adopted flag (since 1995)

[edit] Parliament dismissal

This question was described as "aimed at the obtaining of the consultative decision": Do you agree with the necessity of the introduction of changes into the acting Constitution of the Republic of Belarus, which provide for early termination of the plenary powers of the Supreme Soviet by President of the Republic of Belarus in the case of systematical or gross violations of the Constitution?

77.7% voted for, 17.8 voted against, the remaining bulletins were declared invalid.