On 9 December, the ruling Georgian Dream party (GD) promised that they would accept repeat elections if a temporary investigative commission created by the 10th convocation of the Georgian Parliament reveals that at least 1% of votes were rigged or falsified.  

“We (GD) are sure that there will be no violations and the ruling party did not receive even 0.1 per cent of total votes illegally,” stated the GD Executive Secretary Irakli Kobakhidze, adding that he would leave politics if a commission reveals such a violation. To note, the GD launched an initiative to establish a temporary commission of inquiry into the 2020 parliamentary elections. The commission would provide a comprehensive assessment of the elections using a variety of tools, including large-scale recounting of votes. 

According to Kobakhidze, some political parties in the country were interested in sabotage and that other debutant political parties are positive about GD’s initiatives. Kobakhidze named the United National Movement (UNM) and European Georgia (EG) as the parties who opposed GD’s proposals the most.

Kobakhidze also commented on other issues related to the parliament, noting that parties that do not take up their mandates in parliament would not receive budgetary funding and other benefits. He also stated that the ruling party will initiate a law in the 10th parliament which will disqualify parties from registration for elections if their leaders violate the state constitution. 

Meanwhile, the fourth round of negotiations between the GD and the opposition took place with no broad-based agreement reached between the parties. The leader of EG Davit Bakradze said after the negotiations that there is a fundamental difference between the views on early elections and the release of the political prisoners who are the most important for the opposition. The Chairman of the Georgian Parliament of Georgia, Archil Talakvadze, on his turn, said the ruling team is ready to work on electoral reform and answer all questions raised by the opposition regarding the elections. But a certain radical group is putting pressure on the parties involved in the negotiations to make all the details public.

The EU ambassador to Georgia and one of the facilitators of the political dialogue Carl Hartzell expressed his optimism that the negotiations would come to fruition. “I think over these last two days, we have made some important progress even though discussions are difficult. I think the most encouraging part of the discussion has been that we have managed to find a common ground with regard to future election reforms, which is very important, because this is the key to making sure that future elections will have fewer shortcomings and fewer problems then we saw in these last elections and that we have seen in previous elections as well. So, I think that is good news. The other issues remain on the table, and many of them remain unresolved. We will see whether it is possible to advance further. There is a continued commitment on all participants to the dialogue to continue, and I foresee that we will give it another go tomorrow to see whether we can still make progress before the opening of the next parliament,” he stated.