“I sincerely hope that Georgians among themselves will agree to a situation in which a proper balance is ensured,” said Pawel Herczynski, EU Ambassador to Georgia speaking about the election threshold for the 2024 parliamentary elections in Georgia.

“The newly identified step number four speaks about free and fair elections. It is for the Georgians to collectively decide how to organize the electoral campaign. We sincerely hope that there will be a level playing field that everyone will have a possibility to participate in an electoral campaign. First and foremost, there will be no violence, because violence, electoral violence are absolutely unacceptable in any democratic country.

And, of course, we do not want to have major changes to the rules shortly before elections. So the sooner there is an agreement of all the technicalities the better in order to make sure that everyone is well-prepared and can take part in the electoral campaign,” he said.

According to the EU Ambassador, there are no golden standards in the European Union over the election threshold. However, he remarked that whatever the rules, those rules should be “introduced as quickly as possible in order to ensure a level playing field for everyone.”

“You asked me about the threshold, in fact, this was part of the Charles Michel agreement that was negotiated two years ago. It’s for the Georgians to decide. From our point of view, elections, make sense if the people feel that their voice is heard. So electoral threshold is important because a situation in which a big part of the population feels that their voice is not reflected in the future parliament is not appropriate.

But on the other hand, a situation in which you have a lot of parties represented and it’s very difficult to move forward because there is too much diversity is also not the proper one. These discussions continue, and I sincerely hope that Georgians among themselves will agree to a situation in which a proper balance is ensured.

When it comes to the European Union itself. There is no golden standards. So our member states have different rules. There are countries in which there is an electoral threshold very high 5%, the other countries where there’s no electoral threshold at all. This is important and this will be for the first time, the first fully proportionate elections and we sincerely hope that whatever are the rules, those rules will be introduced as quickly as possible in order to ensure a level playing field for everyone,” he said.