Leader of Strategy Agmashenebeli Giorgi Vashadze refuses to participate in personal meetings with Girchi and Citizens Opposition

In his interview with the PalitraNews channel, the leader of Strategy Agmashenebeli opposition party Giorgi Vashadze claimed that his party refuses to participate in individual meetings with Girchi and Citizens Opposition parties. Vashadze explained the party’s decision, saying that he believes “every arisen issue should be discussed collectively.”

Vashadze told Newsroom that he had a phone call with one of the leaders of Girchi, Vakhtang Megreishvili, stating that “he has no reason to suspect Girchi of following someone else’s orders,” however, he believes that “the proposal that was presented to him will not result in any meaningful changes”.

Vashadze has also responded to the statement made by the head of Citizens Opposition party Aleko Elisashvili, and claimed that a change in the Election Codex and the reformation of the Central Election Commission will not be enough for Strategy Agmashenebeli:

“This would be more than enough for some and would not be sufficient for the others. For Strategy Agmashenebeli, for us, it is not enough. And this is my general response to all the questions they have for me”.

On January 14th, members of the Girchi and Citizens Opposition parties met to discuss the current political crisis and came up with a joint proposal for the other opposition parties. This proposal is more focused on the self-government elections that are expected to be carried out this year, and it calls the other opposition parties to concentrate on winning those. Only once the meaningful victory of the self-government elections is secured, can the opposition parties demand the repeat parliamentary elections in 2022. According to the new joint proposal, should the opposition parties fail to win the upcoming self-government elections, any demands for the repeat elections will lose their legitimacy anyway. Leader of the Citizens Opposition Aleko Elisashvili emphasized the necessity for election reforms.

Prior to Vashadze’s interview with PalitraNews, Girchi’s Vakhtang Megreishvili announced that he is planning to meet with the leaders of Strategy Agmashenebeli, and that he is “90 % certain that they will agree to the new proposal” Megrelishvili will present to them. He added that the upcoming self-government elections should be treated as a test run to determine the balance of political powers within the country.