Saakashvili calls on opposition to leave parliament

Former president of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili has called on opposition MPs to quit their seats in the state legislature and leave the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) alone there. 

Saakashvili claims that the GD fabricated the recent municipal elections and the opposition should take the step in protest. 

He says that ‘he is frustrated’ the GD ‘grabbed our victory.’ 

Saakashvili has praised Lelo leader Mamuka Khazaradze for his decision to leave his mandate. 

UNM MP Nona Mamulashvili has also decided to leave parliament, following Saakashvili’s encouragement. 

The GD has won 63 of 64 mayoral constituencies, and received 43% of the vote in the proportional part of the municipal race. 

The opposition, with the leadership of Saakashvili’s United National Movement, has plans to launch rallies in all big cities starting tomorrow to demand the annulment of the election results. 

Saakashvili, who is a citizen of Ukraine and currently chairs the Executive Committee of the Ukrainian National Reforms Council, was arrested in Tbilisi a day before Georgian municipal elections on October 2.  

He says he returned to the country after eight years in political exile, ‘to save Georgia’ from the ‘pro-Russian rule’ of the Georgian Dream government.  In 2018, the Tbilisi City Court twice tried Saakashvili in absentia and sentenced him to six years in prison for abuse of power.

Both Saakashvili and the UNM expected that the GD would either lose or receive just a few votes in the recent race and the opposition would be able to demand snap parliamentary polls to remove it from power.