Ex-President Saakashvili pledges to arrive in Georgia on election night
By Natalia Kochiashvili
Wednesday, September 29
Former President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili, now a Ukrainian citizen and chair of the Executive Committee of the Ukrainian National Reforms Council, has shared a photo of a booked Kyiv-Tbilisi flight ticket for the evening of the day of Georgia’s municipal elections on October 2.
He urged people to rally behind the opposition and march to the streets after voting booths close to ‘defend votes’. He stated again that the local elections are ‘also a critical referendum for the country’ and that ‘I cannot observe the situation afar’. Saakashvili claimed that his decision to return was motivated only by concerns about Georgia's fate and not by his future political ambitions.
In a video address, Saakashvili stated that the fate of Georgia would be determined in the next elections and that he will travel to the capital city to safeguard the decision of the voters and ‘participate in saving' the nation alongside the people. He hopes that everyone would rally behind one another and put their differences aside. Saakashvili is wanted on multiple charges in Georgia. He pledges that he will return to Georgia this time.
According to the ruling Georgian Dream party, Saakashvili lies frequently on his returns. GD is certain that they will win the elections with at least 46% of the vote, and that Saakashvili, who has pledged to come back to Georgia 17 times, will not do so. On the other hand, GD claims that if he returns, he will be jailed.
Since crowds of his supporters are anticipated to gather at the airport to prevent his detention, Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili gave a notice that those who resist Saakashvili's detention if he arrives will be arrested as well. “No one on this land can oppose or impede the enforcement of the law,” he stressed, yet dismissed claims that people will gather to prevent Saakashvili’s detention, claiming the opposition can ‘barely mobilize 5,000 people.’
“Every provocation will be strictly responded to by the state within the law. If Saakashvili, this coward, decides that there is no place for him in Ukraine and returns to Georgia, the law will be enforced and he will go to prison,” Garibashvili said.
Recall that the April 2021 EU-mediated agreement, which resolved the post-election political standoff in Georgia, obliged the Georgian Dream to accept the holding of repeat parliamentary elections by 2022 if the party received less than 43% of votes in this municipal elections. However, the GD withdrew from the agreement at the end of July and stated that ‘no early elections will take place in the country.’ For information, the biggest opposition party UNM joined the agreement only after the ruling party withdrew.
After the Georgian Dream came to power in 2012, Saakashvili, who served as the country's third president from 2004 to 2013, fled the country in 2013. After ex-President Petro Poroshenko revoked Saakashvili's citizenship in 2017, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy restored it in 2019. In 2015-2016, he was the Governor of Odessa until quitting due to a conflict with Poroshenko.
In Georgia, he faces several criminal charges including the violent dispersal of anti-government mass rallies on November 7, 2007, a riot police raid of TV channel Imedi, the unlawful takeover of property, and other offenses. In particular, in 2018, Saakashvili was sentenced in his absence on 2 separate charges of abuse of power: 3 years for pardoning former Interior Ministry officials convicted in the high-profile murder case of Sandro Girgvliani, and 6 years for organizing an attack on opposition MP Valeri Gelashvili. He is also accused of misappropriating public funds and abusing official power in the 2007 anti-govt protests case. Saakashvili denies the allegations against him, claiming they are politically motivated.
