Ex-President Salome Zourabichvili: There will be no Third Republic whatsoever; Kobakhidze’s prophecy of overthrow is also farce

“There will be no Third Republic whatsoever; there isn’t even a Second Republic yet. We restored independence in 1991 on the basis of the First Republic’s constitution; sometimes knowledge of the constitution and history is rather a good thing,” Georgia’s former President Salome Zourabichvili has stated.

Salome Zourabichvili declares that she will not vote on October 4 and will attend the peaceful demonstration instead.

“I want to respond to, to address Irakli Kobakhidze, who has praised these supposedly fair, tremendous elections that will be held tomorrow and, at the same time, has threatened us that some kind of overthrow is being planned. Both points are lies.

No fair, free elections will be held tomorrow. This will be a farce and a mockery of society, which has been coming out onto the streets peacefully for effectively a year now. The people who take to the streets in order to reclaim their vote and their elections will not be satisfied with the farce that will be conducted tomorrow. There is neither freedom nor any chance of challenge or correction; these are elections being held under the conditions of dictatorship. We saw an example of this in Russia not long ago.

The second and perhaps greater lie may be what Kobakhidze prophesies: that there will be an attempt at overthrow in which everyone will be united. This too is a farce, an insult to a society that has shown the world its resilience, endurance, and supremely peaceful protest throughout this year.

Not on a single day has there been violence or any attempt at it. Two hundred thousand people came out at the beginning, didn’t they? Many may take to the streets tomorrow as well. These individuals have demonstrated to the world that it is possible to voice opposition in the most profoundly peaceful way. This is how we are known to our partners; this is how we have earned their support and the isolation of this regime.

All these developments cannot be ended with a staged overthrow. With these elections, this regime has discredited several parties; now it has decided to discredit the remaining parties through this supposed radicalisation and, most importantly, to thereby extinguish that great, peaceful protest which continues to this day and will continue tomorrow. This is the main force, and the force that this regime cannot withstand. Sometimes there are many people, sometimes more, sometimes fewer, and it persists until we achieve fulfilment of the main demands that stand: parliamentary elections and the peaceful replacement of the regime that has robbed us of our European future.

There will be no Third Republic whatsoever; there isn’t even a Second Republic yet. We restored independence in 1991 on the basis of the First Republic’s constitution; sometimes, knowledge of the constitution and history is rather a good thing.

Everything is a farce. We must not let them drag us into this regime; everyone should remain very calm. I shall not vote tomorrow, and I shall be with my people at tomorrow’s peaceful demonstration, just as I have been at every significant demonstration, and I shall be there for as long as necessary, until the very end,” Salome Zourabichvili declared.