TBILISI, DFWatch–Two Georgian opposition parties, ‘For Georgia’ and ‘Lelo – Strong Georgia’, have decided to join forces ahead of the country’s October 4 local elections.
The two parties signed what they called a memorandum of cooperation, aiming to agree on “a non-partisan neutral candidate for mayor” and align on either majoritarian or joint party-list runs.
This appears to be the first concrete outcome of a call by Giorgi Gakharia earlier for the opposition to form a united opposition bloc.
Berdia Sichinava of For Georgia called the memorandum a strategic countermove. “We are facing a serious political crisis… the ruling party has stepped outside constitutional governance,” he said.
The move has drawn criticism from both the ruling party and hardline opposition figures.
Tina Bokuchava of the United National Movement (UNM), which is boycotting the elections, accused the alliance of colluding with the ruling party: “This is not a cooperation pact between Gakharia and Khazaradze. This is a pact between those two forces and Bidzina Ivanishvili.” She also warned that “Money cannot decide the fate of our country.”
Ruling Georgian Dream MP Davit Matikashvili portrayed the election partnership as pointless: “They are under the illusion that, with their minimal support, they can defeat Georgian Dream. No memorandum will help them,” he said, predicting they’ll be “defeated in all 64 municipalities.”
Analyst Nika Chitadze thinks the alliance of Gakharia and Lelo will face problems in winning, partly due to the boycott and partly because of the ruling Georgian Dream is in charge of organizing the election.
Lelo – Strong Georgia leader Mamuka Khazaradze, who is serving an eight months prison sentence for refusing to appear before a parliamentary commission, issued a written statement from prison, urging opposition parties still boycotting the upcoming local elections to join the memorandum between his party and For Georgia.
“I welcome the signing of the joint memorandum between Lelo–Strong Georgia and Gakharia’s team,” wrote Khazaradze. “It is important not to leave the opposition electorate without elections and not to allow Georgian Dream to easily take over all local representation in every city and region, because this will be an important foothold and platform for our final victory,” said Khazaradze, whose sentence also bars him from holding public office for two years.
