Georgian opposition has a chance

In the evening, the Formula TV Company (Georgia) presented the results of a sociological research conducted by the Edison Research company (USA). According to the poll, if parliamentary elections were held tomorrow, people would vote as follows:

"Georgian Dream" - 39%

“United National Movement” - 16%

"European Georgia - Free Democrats" - 5%

“Labor Party” - 3%

"Lelo for Georgia" - 3%

"For a New Georgia" - 3%

“Alliance of Patriots” - 3%

"Girchi" - 2%

"Civil Movement" - 2%

"Democratic Movement - United Georgia" - 1%

"Winning Georgia" - 1%

"For justice" - 1%

"Free Georgia" - 1%

Twenty percent of the respondents note that they have not yet decided for whom they will vote.

The upcoming parliamentary elections in October, the victory of the ruling “Georgian Dream” looks obvious, especially if to take into account the administrative resource and 30 majoritarian districts in which candidates from the ruling parties traditionally win. This is not surprising, in countries where democratic institutions are underdeveloped and the authorities use administrative resources during elections, the majority electoral system always works in favor of the current government.

Until now, parliamentary elections in Georgia have been held according to a mixed electoral system - out of 150 deputies, 77 were elected by party lists, and 73 deputies - by the majority system (i.e., out of 73 majoritarian constituencies in Georgia). The mandates received by the parties under the proportional and majority systems were mechanically combined; the winning party received much more mandates than votes.

For example, if a party won the proportional system with 40 percent of the vote (about 30 seats in parliament) and 50 out of 73 majoritarian districts, then it ended up winning 80 seats. By virtue of all this, the Georgian opposition fought fiercely for the complete abolition of the majority system and ultimately, thanks to the support of the West, it managed to achieve constitutional amendments to the Electoral Code of Georgia.

According to these changes, in the upcoming parliamentary elections in October 120 MPs will be elected according to the proportional system, and 30 - according to the majoritarian system (previously there were 73, and in the next elections, the majority system will be abolished altogether). At the same time, the electoral barrier was reduced to 1%. A party that won less than 40.54% of the vote in the elections will not be able to form a government independently.

As it has already been said, the probability of victory of the ruling Georgian Dream party in the upcoming elections looks higher than that of the opposition. Yet the opposition has a chance to reverse this situation. First, Facebook has been setting new rules for the transparency of political and election advertising in Georgia since August. From now on, everyone who publishes political advertising will have to indicate the customer of the advertisement, who paid for it and for what amount; users in what geographic area and at what age are the target audience of advertising. This way, people will be able to see who is trying to influence their votes in the elections.

Because of an audit conducted by the Facebook administration on December 20, 2019, hundreds of fake Facebook pages with links to the top government were identified and destroyed in Georgia. The destroyed pages, as one, presented to the audience definitely positive news about the authorities, officials and negative news about opposition leaders and activists. Approximately 442,300 people became victims of such disinformation. Considering that, according to the CEC of Georgia, 1,814,276 voters took part in the parliamentary elections on October 8, 2016, which is 51.63% of the number of voters in Georgia; this impressive figure that can seriously affect the election result.

Secondly, on July 15, the Foreign Affairs Committee of the European Parliament published a report assessing Georgia's implementation of the Association Agreement with the EU.

In their report, the MEPs focused on the upcoming parliamentary elections and reminded the Georgian authorities that EU support will depend on the progress made in implementing reforms. In particular, mention is made of reforms in the areas of democracy and the rule of law, including the redistribution of power, the independence of the judiciary and the reform of the electoral system.

MEPs said that the upcoming parliamentary elections in October would be important for confirming Georgia's democratic course. The MPs expressed their hope that the election campaign will be held in conditions of fair competition.

In addition, MEPs called on the Georgian authorities to refrain from initiating political proceedings against media owners and to take steps to prevent disinformation campaigns.

In this context, they stressed the importance of editorial independence as well as impartial coverage of political views in the programs of both private and public broadcasters during the upcoming election campaign.

Obviously, this means that the West will recognize the October elections as valid if the ruling Georgian Dream party conducts them in a normal environment. All this can contribute to the success of the opposition, but only on one condition - if it manages to consolidate.

Almost immediately after the parliament approved the new law (June 29), opposition representatives announced that they had begun consultations on candidates for prime minister and single candidates in majoritarian constituencies in order to oppose the power candidate. However, judging by the statements of the opposition, these consultations will not be easy. For example, the “Lelo for Georgia” association announced that it will have its own candidates in all thirty constituencies, and to cooperate and advise its electorate to vote for a candidate from another opposition party, as one of the Lelo leaders Badri Japaridze said, they will in case of appointment of the second round.

Discussions over candidates for prime ministers and majoritarian members raise doubts that the opposition, united against the Georgian Dream, will win the parliamentary elections. To this, it should be added that political parties are passive in working with voters. They do not actively advocate. They should educate people that political changes will affect their economic life.

An Edison Research poll showed that the united opposition would gain about the same number of votes as the Georgian Dream. This means that in order to win, she needs to stop “dividing the skin of non-killed bear” and start fighting for those 20% of citizens who have not yet decided for whom they will vote. Who knows, maybe then they will be able to work a miracle?