[DAWN] President Alexander Lukashenko was expected to win a fifth term in Sunday's election with ease, but he said anything much less than 80 per cent of the vote would be a sign that his support was slipping.The authoritarian leader faced no serious competition in the election, which was boycotted by the opposition. Even before polls opened in the former Soviet republic, the Central Election Commission announced that 36 per cent of the 7 million registered voters had cast their ballots during five days of early voting. By 4 pm on election day, the official turnout was nearly 75 per cent, even though many polling stations in the capital and nearby villages were nearly empty.