Public Assembly 'annuls' new constitution

The Representative Public Assembly was a success and all the oppositional leaders supporting the idea of the Public Assembly share common views, declared the Assembly representatives after holding their demonstration on Rustaveli Avenue, on November 25. Other opposition parties reacted rather negatively to the event, while the authorities have not reacted at all.

On November 25 before thousands of demonstrators on Rustaveli Avenue, the Representative Public Assembly declared its distrust in the President, Mikheil Saakashvili and the current authorities as well as announcing the annulment of the new constitution of Georgia.

“The unification of opposition leaders existed; there is no disagreement among them. We have targeted our future plans and discussed the date for the first meeting of the Assembly executive council,” one of the initiators of the Representative Public Assembly, Irakli Batiashvili, said.

Chair of the Representative Public Assembly, Nona Gaprindashvili stated, “We have gathered and discussed the issue, we will announce our action plan, probably, on November 29.”

Georgian Free Democrats believe the public assembly protest rally was groundless. The party’s leader, Irakli Alasania said similar actions cannot bring positive results in politics. He thinks that decisions should not be made in the street and any political team should try to change the situation through elections. “The only right way for changes in our country is changing the electoral environment and defeating the National Movement in elections. There is no alternative to this way and any political party that tries to persuade people that any other way exists is just insincere to its own society.”

National-Democrats have the same view. “It is regrettable that the November 25-26 events disturbed the process of changing the election environment,” Bachuki Kardava, from the party, said.

As for the authorities, the event turned out even funnier and less serious for them, than the beginning of some significant changes in the country. “The fact that the Assembly has annulled the new constitution of Georgia and not some other countries, I hope that we will avoid international scandal,” MP, Pavle Kublashvili, said. Fellow MP, Akaki Minashvili commented, “To put it simply, those decisions are ridiculous.”

Analyst Paata Zakareishvili said, the meeting was the public presentation of Nino Burjanadze’s (former Parliament Speaker of Georgia, leader of the Democratic Movement-United Georgia) political movement, “It was the legitimising the date of the representative Public Assembly, which is not bad, but it was not what they had promised the people. The most important thing is sincerity. Society should know what they propose and what to expect and we received the presentation of a new political movement. It was the presentation of Nino Burjanadze’s political movement and other opposition parties took the bait.”

According to analyst Ramaz Sakvarelidze, “The Representative Public Assembly might hold strikes and street rallies, however, who will go on strike, when, in fact the majority of society is unemployed? Large scale street rallies might start if the authorities impose some restrictions on them. In this regard the authorities’ actions have been really surprising. The increase in the price of water and decisions like this, when you practically leave the people without living means, it is very natural then that they will come out into the streets.”