“Entering the elections now means sitting down to play cards with a cheat, which would be a betrayal of the people we care about,” former President of Georgia, jailed Mikheil Saakashvili, posted on social media.

As Saakashvili notes, since the last parliamentary elections, the Election Commission has not become more transparent or democratic. Instead, “the regime has become even more repressive.”

“Once again, concerning these ‘local elections’, everyone knows that the previous parliamentary elections were completely rigged. The question now is: what has changed since then? Has the Election Commission become more transparent and democratic? No. Is the regime less repressive? On the contrary. Are the people demanding participation in new elections? The vast majority opposes it,” Saakashvili posted.

The ex-president concluded: “Entering the elections now means sitting down to play cards with a cheat, which would be a betrayal of the people we care about.”