Dead people in the election lists

Shorena Kakabadze

8 days before the Election Day, the representatives of the political parties talk about dead people in the election lists. 

“The topic is still a problem similar to prior years. Why they did not look trough the lists substantially, why dead people are still there?! Let’s leave those people alone”, - Giorgi Tsulaia, the head of the Kutaisi Organization of the political party Free Georgia declared.  

Couple of days before, Temur Tsamtsishvili, the member of the political party Girchi and former single mandate candidate from the political party Paata Burtchuladze – State for People emphasized the problem. Contrary to the representatives of other parties, he presented concrete names from the election list and accused the Ministry of Justice and Kutaisi District Election Commission in the problem. He explained there are 130 dead people in the voters list of the Kutaisi Election District #48. 

“It is not the problem which we can neglect. We talk about tens of dead people, who are still in the election lists. We have been fighting against the problem for years. We call on the relevant bodies, in particular, the Kutaisi District Election Commission #59, to pay attention to the problem and make relevant steps”, - Temur Tsamtsishvili, the new member of the political party Girchi, who canceled his single mandate candidacy from the Kutaisi Election District #48 ten days before, because of the confrontations inside the coalition Paata Burtchuladze – State for People. 

Humanrights.ge contacted the Kutaisi District Election Commission #59 and the commission members explained that removal of the dead people from the election list is not their competency, moreover, when there are no concrete names. 

“It is indeed a problem, but, we cannot tackle it. Removal of the dead people from the election list shall be done by the Public Registry. Dead person’s family member shall go to the Public Registry and state that the person died. The complaints of the representatives of the political parties cannot be satisfied easily. Temur Tsamtsishvili, the representative of the Girchi, applied to us, however, he could not present full documentation, which is necessary to start eradication of the problem. The personal information of concrete people and their number in the election list shall be presented, only afterwards they can be extracted from the list. Other mechanisms simply do not exist”, - Avtandil Osepaishvili, the head of the Kutaisi District Election Commission #59 clarified. 

In the DEC, they said the issue is indeed problematic, although, the speculation with the problem is not correct and if there is a problem, the political parties shall speak more precisely and present concrete facts.