Misc

The Georgian Dream is Dead, Long Live Georgian Dream

Nov 26, 2024

Georgia is a small country next to the Black Sea, partly on the European landmass and partly in Asia. Famous as the birthplace of wine and for its Kartvelian script, Georgia borders Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan and most importantly, Russia. Georgia is also a democracy, and on Nov 25th 2024 the Georgian people took to the polling stations to place their votes in the parliamentary election.

This election was important. Georgia was formerly part of the soviet union, and only properly left it in 2003. Over the years it developed closer ties to the West and even achieved candidate status for the EU in 2023 (shortly after Russia began its invasion of Ukraine). Walking around Tbilisi, the capital, you get a promising sense of where Georgia-EU relations are going. The yellow stars of the EU flag can be seen everywhere, and sometimes even the stripes and whites stars of the US flag. ‘Fuck Putin’ is graffitied on walls all over the city, and you’re guaranteed to get a similar stance if you talk to young Georgians.

The ruling party, however, has different ideas. Georgian Dream was founded in 2012 with a pro-EU and pro-western stance and quickly rose to power. In recent years however, they’ve taken a sharp turn towards Russia despite continuing to promise the Georgian people closer ties with Europe. To a Western eye, their election campaign was confusingly double-sided. On the one hand, they had posters with the Georgian Dream logo merged into the EU flag (the colours even match), but on the other hand, party funded billboards displayed harrowing photos of bombed buildings in Ukraine side-by-side with photos of prospering infrastructure in Georgia. The message was clear; you don’t want Russia as your enemy. Some have linked the shift in the parties stance to their chairman and billionaire backer, Bidzina Ivanishvili. Ivanishvili made his $7.6 billion fortune (equivalent to approximately a quarter of Georgia’s GDP) in Russia in the 90’s before founding Georgian dream.

Russia has a bad record of interfering in the elections of post-soviet countries, but the motivation why isn’t obvious. Is the endgame to eventually claim those countries back under the soviet banner? If so, why would policy makers comply given that they risk losing their power to Putin? Despite Russia being by far the largest country in the world, it’s trying to grow even bigger. The Serbian government is pro-Russia, particularly since Kosovo broke away from the country with backing from Europe and the US. At a bar in Tbilisi’s Old Town, I spoke to a Serbian man who told me about his experience of voting in Serbia’s last election. Prior to election day, he was the only person registered at his address. On the day of the election he checked again, only to find that twenty others had started living at same address. This is the problem with taking a pro-Russia position; it’s incompatible with democracy. There can be no future for Georgia as an EU member in Putin’s pocket.

During the night of the 25th, polling results began to come in. After a promising start for the opposition, polls began to tilt towards Georgian Dream, and by midday on the 26th the ruling party had cemented victory. At the time of writing, the opposition isn’t taking the "defeat" lightly. Footage of a Georgian Dream official stuffing multiple votes into a ballot box and reports of an opposition party official being attacked outside a polling station has led to calls of foul play, and that the vote-count is illegitimate. To those in favour of Georgian Dream, the opposition's unwillingness to accept the results of the election probably look like a rejection of the democratic process. To those who favour closer ties to the EU, the election was clearly delegitimized by illegal tactics. Perhaps this it what Russia intended; create chaos then stand back as the democratic institutions begin to fold.

Whatever the next days (and years) have in store, Georgians will have to fight hard to keep the dream alive.