Georgia’s ruling party on course for victory amid charges of vote-rigging

TBILISI, Georgia — The governing Georgian Dream party looks set to retain control of Georgia in Saturday’s nationwide vote amid growing allegations of widespread political violence and intimidation.

Provisional results from the Central Election Committee show the Georgian Dream party took 53 percent of the vote, while the united opposition coalition that passed the 5 percent threshold attracted 38 percent.

Tina Bokuchava, head of the opposition United National Movement party, said her opposition coalition would not accept the results of the “stolen election.”

“Oligarch Ivanishvili has stolen victory from the Georgian people and robbed them of their European future,” said Bokuchava. “I hope other opposition parties will share this stance.”

Speaking to POLITICO at a rally at the party’s headquarters Saturday evening, Bidzina Ivanishvili, the chairman of Georgian Dream, said he was expecting a “big victory.”

Before the polls had even closed, Georgian Dream Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said the results were a “landslide victory” for the ruling party.

“We are seeing very encouraging data from regions and cities, especially Tbilisi, for Georgian Dream,” said Mamuka Mdinaradze, the party’s parliamentary leader, prior to the polls closing.

After contradictory exit polls, commissioned by opposition-leaning and pro-government channels, predicted victories for both sides, celebrations began at their respective headquarters.

In comments to POLITICO, Tina Bokuchava said she expected Ivanishvili “to make a statement in next few hours on peaceful transfer of power.”

“I think there will be temptation for him to cling on power, but the lead of opposition is so significant that he will have to accept defeat,” she said, confident that the ruling party had lost as predicted by an Edison Research exit poll.

Meanwhile, the country’s pro-Western president, Salome Zurabichvili, claimed that parties in favor of joining the EU had won, “despite attempts to rig elections and without votes from the diaspora.” Overseas polling stations are continuing to accept ballots.

According to Ketevan Chachava, a fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, “the polling station results we are seeing now are based on the electronic voting machines — around two-thirds of the overall, but that could still change. However, the expectation is that Georgian Dream’s votes would be lower than previous elections and this figure is actually higher than predicted and they’re clearly in a strong position.”

Opposition parties have cried foul over what they said amounted to systematic efforts to influence the result by the increasingly authoritarian government, which has vowed to ban its opponents from taking up their seats and outlaw rival factions if re-elected with a sufficient majority.

“They are stuffing ballot boxes, bullying voters and beating observers,” said Bokuchava, leader of the largest opposition party in the coalition. “These are not the actions of a government who believe in free and fair elections.”

Photos and videos posted online throughout the day showed disruption at polling stations around the country, with claims one ballot box had been dumped in the street and a clip of a Georgian Dream politician purportedly stuffing a stack of ballots into another. One opposition observer was beaten in the city of Marneuli, near to the capital of Tbilisi, while local journalists were attacked by unidentified individuals.

One foreign election observer, granted anonymity to speak candidly with POLITICO, said there had been a brawl in another polling station, close to the country’s border with neighboring Azerbaijan. “We’ve witnessed ballot-stuffing attempts where the perpetrators were discovered, ran away, and then simply waited for observers to leave before trying again,” the observer said. “Given the number of similar accusations from other polling stations, I’m afraid international observers will have a very hard time acknowledging these elections as fair.”

The International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED), a Tbilisi-based NGO, said in a statement that “incidents and violations were recorded throughout the country during the voting process.” One in ten of its election observers reported problems, including allegations of voters being bussed in by Georgian Dream co-ordinators, it said.

At the same time, Georgian Dream accused opposition parties of “violations,” and said police were investigating accusations that an opposition politician “slapped” one of the ruling party’s coordinators outside a polling station.

EU dreams

Georgia was granted candidate status by the EU in December, but has seen its application to join the bloc frozen after passing a slew of Russian-style legislation clamping down on political rights and civil society. In May, Georgian Dream forced through a bill that brands Western-backed NGOs, media outlets and human rights groups as “foreign agents,” and has passed a law effectively outlawing all public references to the LGBTQ+ community, forcing broadcasters to censor content and banning Pride events.

Authorities used tear gas and batons to disperse protests over the move, which critics said echoed tactics used by the Kremlin to stifle dissent in Russia, and organizers were detained and beaten in custody. The U.S. has imposed sanctions on Georgian Dream politicians and police officers over the crackdown.

Kobakhidze said in August that his government would move to ban all parliamentary opposition parties, including the UNM, if the party retains power in the critical electoral contest. “I believe that abolishing [parliamentary] mandates will be the logical continuation of outlawing these parties. Criminal members of the criminal political forces shouldn’t exercise the status such as that of a member of Georgia parliament,” he said.

Responding to a question from POLITICO ahead of the vote, the UNM’s Bokuchava said she “wouldn’t entertain the possibility” of the UNM having to dissolve because she didn’t believe Georgian Dream “would ever be given the mandate” to govern the country.

The opposition and experts lay the blame for Georgia’s rapid pivot away from the EU and toward Russia on Ivanishvili, the country’s richest man and the founder of Georgian Dream, who exerts significant personal control over the party, the judiciary and the state.