Protesters to ‘welcome’ MPs coming back from summer recess at the Parliament
By Levan Abramishvili
Thursday, August 29
As the organizers of the rally say, they will welcome the lawmakers with a “corridor of shame”
“After the summer recess, on September 3, Parliament will start working. Us, the citizens have not spent a single day vacationing this summer. Citizens have spent this summer in front of the Parliament, in front of the Bidzina’s [Ivanishvili] Business Center, at the occupation line, in front of the Prosecutor's Office, in front of the media, in front of the court, in the court, in pre-trial detention, in prison and in the service of the county.
The welcoming ceremony for the members of the Parliament will be held on September 3, at 11:00. We await every one of you at all three entrances of the Parliament, with whistles and banners. Let’s remind them who they should be working for in reality,” say the organizers of the rally.
The anti-occupation protests, which began on June 20, changed their format to anti-occupation shows on July 22 and is held traditionally at 20:20 ever since in front of the Parliament building. The show gets broadcast through the online media outlets.
The protests didn’t stop despite the ongoing filming of the Hollywood movie ‘Fast and Furious 9’ on Rustaveli Avenue, which closed down on August 26 until September 3.
“As you’re aware, the information sphere is obscured by disinformation pages and channels generously financed by state or private funds that are trying to discredit the manifestation that fights for justice in the country. To avoid false speculations about these two events – ‘Fast and Furious’ shootings and our protests (such as “because of this, the country is losing millions!”), we felt an obligation to clarify that we’ve met with the team working on the movie weeks before and we came to an agreement,” said Shota Dighmelashvili, one of the organizers of the rally.
According to Dighmelashvili, although Rustaveli is closed down, ‘Fast and Furious’ is only being filmed in broad daylight, and by 20:20, when #shame begins, the filming process will be completed and the rally organizers will have the opportunity to continue their demonstration smoothly with the existing format.
“Both sides will do their jobs without hindrance. So far, I have not had the opportunity to publicly thank the team, both Georgian and American. My deepest gratitude to them for taking the initiative and the highest civic self-awareness!” said Dighmelashvili.
Anti-occupation protest called #shame has been going on for over two months, sparked by a Russian MP’s visit at the Georgian Parliament, the protests continued after the night of June 20-21 dispersal. Some of the initial demands of the protests were met, including the resignation of the Chairman of the Parliament Irakli Kobakhidze and announcement that the 2020 parliamentary elections would be held with proportional system and ‘zero’ threshold. However, two months in, the anti-occupation protesters still demand the resignation of Giorgi Gakharia, the Minister of Internal Affairs, for the dispersal of the protests, dubbed as the ‘Gavrilov night’, after the Russian lawmaker.