Ask people to predict the result in this weekend’s parliamentary election in Georgia, and you will get an “absolutely no idea” or a “totally up in the air” coming straight back at you.
Which is strange when you consider the fact that the matter before the voters in this small but strategically vital nation goes to the very root of what it means to be a Georgian.
Here is the question – are we talking about a Georgia as a European-style democracy-to-be, on the pathway to membership in the European Union and NATO?
Alternatively, are we preparing for a Russian-style autocracy that will operate as a satellite of its over-sized northerly neighbour?
Founder of the Georgian Dream party Bidzina Ivanishvili casts his vote. Pic: Reuters
The ruling party here, called “Georgian Dream”, has morphed over the course of the past 12 years from an expressly pro-Western government to an organisation that has closely aligned itself with Moscow.
Its founder and controller, Bidzina Ivanishvili, is a billionaire businessman who made his fortune in Russia during the chaos that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. More importantly, say his critics, Ivanishvili thinks and governs like a powerful Russian.
His party’s Kremlin-like ‘foreign influence’ law, which was enacted this summer amid massive public protests, threatens the activities of media outlets, civil rights groups and other non-governmental organisations.
Similarly, Georgian Dream has introduced sweeping restrictions on LGBTQ+ rights in the name of “family values” and “the protection of minors.” Once again, the legislation mirrors similar measures in Russia.
But Ivanishvil is prepared to go further, pledging to ban all pro-Western opposition groups if the party wins a constitutional majority in the upcoming poll. Perhaps more than any other measure, it is this promise that has thrown the country’s future into doubt.
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Interestingly, Georgian Dream rejects this “pro-Russian” characterisation – in fact Bidzine Ivanishvili rarely mentions Russia in his speeches.
Instead, it says it is the ‘party of peace’, seeking to de-escalate tensions with their neighbour. The West on the other hand is portrayed as the ‘global war party’, ready to suck the country into a Ukraine-style war with Russia.
President Salome Zourabichvili after casting her vote
Leading the attempt to unseat the ruling party is the Georgian President, Salome Zourabichvili. The former diplomat, who was born in France, is a staunch European and has been leading the fight to stop the country’s drift into Russia’s orbit.
More importantly, she has also been working as political organiser, uniting dozens of fractious parties behind a plan that would see technocratic government take power for one year after the election. This administration would implement reforms to re-start accession talks with the European Union.
It is a not inconsiderable achievement for someone who has spent much of her working life in France – but in another way, should not really surprise us.
Georgia has been consistently pro-Western since its emergence from the rubble of the Soviet Union and the polls still show that to be true.
More than 80% back membership of the EU, with 67% supporting membership in NATO, putting a significant proportion of the country’s 3.8 million people at odds with the ruling party.
Yet Georgian Dream’s brand of populist conservativism has won it a solid base.
Critically, it uses Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a tool to warn Georgians off better relations with the West. Why risk a “second front” they say in this destructive conflict.
It is an extremely tight contest with few – if any – reliable polls to guide us. At this point, only one thing that clear – nobody knows who will come out on top.
