Georgian Dream win Georgia election as observer group calls for annulment of the vote

Official preliminary results show that Georgian Dream has convincingly won Georgia’s parliamentary elections, in a vote marred by violations.

With 85% of precincts reporting results, the central election commission has given Georgian Dream 54% of the vote. This would give them 89 of 150 MPs, far above the 76 needed for a majority.

This is higher than the 48% the party secured in the previous parliamentary election in 2020.

Four opposition parties crossed the 5% threshold to enter parliament, the Coalition for Change,  Unity — National Movement, Strong Georgia, and For Georgia.

[Read more: Who’s who in Georgia’s parliamentary elections?]

Turnout when polls closed at 20:00 was 59%.

Soon after the outcome became clear, a coalition of civil society groups set up to observe the 2024 election has accused the government of undertaking ‘a complex scheme of election fraud’ and demanded the annulment of the results.

WeVote consists of several leading NGOs and civil society organisations including Transparency International — Georgia, Georgia’s Reforms Associates (GRASS), the Civil Society Foundation, IDFI, and more. The group sent 2,000 observers to polling stations across the country. 

All four major opposition groupings disputed the results. 

Tina Bokuchava of Unity — National Movement said the Central Election Commission had ‘fulfilled Ivanishvili’s dirty order’ and that he ‘stole the European future’ from the Georgian people. 

‘We’ll fight like never before’, she added.

Nika Gvaramia of the Coalition for Change accused the government of conducting a ‘constitutional coup’.

Strong Georgia said the results ‘do not correspond to the real will of the citizens of Georgia’.

Ana Dolidze, one of Strong Georgia’s leaders, said they were ‘enraged by what the Central Election Commission dared to present and write’.

‘These numbers obtained as a result of the elections held against the background of general intimidation, fraud, and bribery contradict the historical [choice] of the Georgian people’, she said.

Kakha Kaladze, the mayor of Tbilisi and Georgian Dream general secretary, threatened ‘a very strict response’ if anyone ‘dares to take steps against the law’, according to IPN.

It came in response to a question from a pro-government journalist about an ‘expected coup on the part of the opposition’.

‘When you organise a coup, you must have the support of society and the people. Today, the opposition, this radical group, is defeated’, Kaladze said.

OC Media observed violations throughout the day, including violations of voter secrecy.

At one point during the day, a group of men, ostensibly Georgian Dream supporters, attempted to storm the opposition UNM party’s offices in Tbilisi. There were also several brawls at polling stations.

The results showed a more stark geographical split in the vote than in previous years. While a majority in the capital Tbilisi voted for the opposition, in rural areas, Georgian Dream took a massive share of the vote.

In several regions with large ethnic minority populations, the official results gave Georgian Dream up to 90% of the vote.

Results from one polling station in Marneuli were annulled after footage emerged of two men stuffing multiple ballots into the box.

Following the incident, President Salome Zourabichvili said it was ‘immoral to use an ethnic minority to rig the elections’.