Two of the four opposition parties that passed the threshold in the parliamentary elections have applied to the Central Election Commission to cancel their lists. The leaders of the Coalition for Change and Unity - National Movement, Nika Gvaramia and Tina Bokuchava, announced this today in parallel briefings. As per preliminary data from the CEC, these two parties hold a total of 34 parliamentary mandates.
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"Parliament is illegitimate. Therefore, we consider participation in this parliament as complicity in illegitimate actions. This is the position of our coalition. The coalition's list included 82 people. The statement we present to you is signed by all 82 members - not only those recognized by the CEC as elected, which includes 20 people. We all refuse to cooperate in any form with the regime that steals elections and represents the interests of the Russian Federation in our homeland," said Nika Gvaramia.
He added that each member of the electoral list is applying to the CEC not to register as an elected member of the Parliament of Georgia and to refrain from issuing a temporary certificate of their election as a member of Parliament.
"This is a legally correct statement, but we understand that the CEC and Parliament may begin making illegal decisions.
As many times as necessary, all 82 members of this list will sign waivers. We hereby confirm that the parliament is illegitimate, and our participation in it is excluded. We cannot grant it legitimacy through our presence," said Gvaramia.
According to Tina Bokuchava, leader of Unity - National Movement and the first on their electoral list, she and each list member will submit individual applications to the Central Election Commission.
"The letters we send to the CEC express our free will, and we request that none of us - none of the individuals on the electoral list of Unity - National Movement - be given a temporary mandate. We should not be registered or bound, and our names and surnames should not be sent to Parliament for recognition of our authority.
We refuse to accept mandates from these parliamentary elections, which were entirely fraudulent. The most important constitutional principle - the secrecy of the vote - was violated, thus negating the free will of the Georgian people, amid numerous other manipulations and mass violations, the results of which are not recognized by the civilized world," Bokuchava stated.
The Central Election Commission has yet to finalize the results of the October 26 parliamentary elections. As per current data, Unity - National Movement holds 16 mandates in the legislative body, while Coalition for Change holds 18.
CEC data shows that 53.93% of voters (1 120 053 voters) cast ballots for Georgian Dream in the parliamentary elections. The legitimacy of this result is not recognized, and the opposition parties that passed the threshold are demanding an international investigation. The votes were distributed as follows:
- Coalition for Change (11.034%)
- Unity - National Movement (10.17%)
- Strong Georgia (8.808%)
- Gakharia for Georgia (7.777%)
President Salome Zourabichvili also believes that the elections were "completely falsified." She stated that Georgia has become "a hub of Russian special operations."
