Constitutional Amendments

Lado Bitchashvili, Shida Kartli

The Parliament of Georgia will start working on the amendments in the Constitution in the fall of 2019 to hold the 2020 Parliamentary Elections with the proportional system. The Parliament needs constitutional majority to shift from the mixed election system into proportional. Considering the fact that the Georgian Dream lost the constitutional majority in the Parliament and one part of the single mandate MPs do not support the proportional system, but the opposition supports it but without natural barrier, the issue of shifting to the proportional system may not succeed in the Parliament. Non-parliamentary opposition is particularly concerned about it. 

“It is without doubt that the proportional system is the positive decision. The only threat is that the Georgian Dream will not be able to cope with this process alone because they have lost the constitutional majority in the parliament and to implement some amendments they need full consensus in the opposition because one part of the majoritarian MPs of the ruling party plan to oppose the initiative. It will be serious strike for the Georgian Dream, because if they have to give up their promise about the proportional system, it will result into complicated processes,” one of the leaders of the Movement of Construction Soso Vakhtangashvili said. 

Mixed or proportional election system? – regardless the controversial opinions about the issue, the majoritarian MPs from Shida Kartli region state they will take the desire of the society into account and support the proportional system. 

“We will see whether mixed or proportional system is better, but it is already decided that the 2020 parliamentary elections will be held with the proportional system and I hope we will have better parliament than now. Let’s see how the situation will develop with the natural barrier. Many political parties will have chance to enter the parliament,” Gori municipality majoritarian MP Temur Khubuluri said.

Unlike his team-member, the majoritarian MP Ioseb Makrakhidze from the Gori city spoke about positive aspects of the mixed system: “The country, which is strong, shall have proportional system. But in the country, which has economic problems, the majoritarian MPs do their job.”

Majoritarian MP from Khashuri municipality Simon Nozadze thinks the parliament shall act like the society wishes.

“The Georgian Dream, when it accepted the proposal to shift to the proportional election system, aimed to maintain stable situation in the country. If 2020 parliamentary elections will be held with the mixed system, the Georgian Dream would have won it. In case of proportional system, the GD may have to lose governance. However, I still believe that in 2020 the government will be composed of the members of the GD and it will be coalition government,” Simon Nozadze said.

Majoritarian MP from Kareli municipality Giorgi Totladze said the parliament will be more democratic and multi-party with the proportional system. Kaspi municipality MP Irakli Mezurnishvili supports the mixed model of the parliamentary elections. 

“The mixed system is coherent to the democracy but we saw that the society wants to shift to the proportional system, that will enable the political parties to reinforce and enter the parliament,” Mezurnishvili said.

The majoritarian MPs from the Shida Kartli region state they will support the amendments in the constitution.