Parliament Speaker: Former PM Gakharia’s party part of opposition front; updated lawsuit seeks outright ban

“It was evident from the outset that Giorgi Gakharia was part of a unified United National Movement (UNM) front, a point Georgian Dream has consistently highlighted,” Speaker of the Parliament of Georgia Shalva Papuashvili stated regarding the ruling party’s expanded constitutional lawsuit.

Papuashvili asserted that the Gakharia For Georgia party is inherently unconstitutional, noting that the ruling party has submitted detailed legal arguments in the updated lawsuit before the Constitutional Court.

“Right before the 2024 parliamentary elections, there was an active campaign around the numbers ‘4-5-9-25’, signalling that a vote for any of these factions was ultimately a vote for a single objective. Indeed, then-President Salome Zourabichvili stated as much explicitly, urging voters to support any of the four entities, as doing so would serve one overarching purpose.

So this was clear from the start. It was further demonstrated when they declared a parliamentary boycott, refusing to enter the legislature for an entire year. As you know, the first cohort of these MPs had their mandates terminated due to persistent non-attendance. It was only after the 4 October coup attempt collapsed, as one of their own leaders admitted, that they finally entered Parliament.

Despite this, we allowed them to return to the constitutional order and recognise it. Yet we see that nothing has changed. They refuse to acknowledge the constitutional order. Consequently, in our assessment, this party is unconstitutional, and the corresponding legal grounds are fully detailed in our updated lawsuit,” Papuashvili stated.

Through the amended constitutional lawsuit, Georgian Dream is formally seeking to outlaw the Gakharia For Georgia party. The ruling party had previously lodged a constitutional lawsuit requesting that the activities of the United National Movement (UNM), the Coalition for Change, Strong Georgia–Lelo, and the Federalists be declared unconstitutional and banned.