As a way out from the political crisis in Georgia, opposition parties are asking for early elections, what new can happen if we schedule early elections? Nothing!
Nothing has changed with the political landscape since the summer period that preceded the October 2020 elections, the same mistrust and hatred prevails between the Georgian Dream and the opposition parties.
Early elections would be an exact replica of a poker game between two adversaries who are holding again exactly the same cards they had in hand in the previous game.
The Georgian Dream will still rig the elections using the same methods they used in October, and the elections results will be exactly the same.
-Why is it that a fox rarely catches a hare during a chase?
-Because if the fox is running for its dinner, the hare is running for its life!
If the opposition parties are running for power, the Georgian Dream officials are running for their lives, since would opposition come to power, many of the Georgian Dream officials could well be jailed and their assets seized.
When Saakashvili came to power in 2004, he jailed seven ministers and high ranking officials from the Shevardnadze’s Administration.
When Ivanishvili came to power in 2012 he also jailed seven of Saakashvili’s high ranking ministers and officials.
When the opposition will come to power, whenever this might happen, it is very likely that we will witness a similar scenario, and that high ranking officials from the Georgian Dream will also be jailed.
Based on the above, the ONLY way forward to stop this vicious cycle is a genuine “National Reconciliation” between the parties, based on the principal of “No losers/No winners”.
Such a reconciliation will turn the page of the political persecution that had started back in 2004 and that continues till this very moment.
National Reconciliation will open a brand new page between the various political forces in Georgia;
the core of such a reconciliation is to build trust between the parties, and for that, all political prisoners should be released, all political charges dropped, all those who had to run away from the country fearing persecution should be allowed to return back unharmed.
By the same token all Georgian Dream officials should be granted immunity from prosecution for any crime they might have committed since 2012 till the signature of such an agreement.
Only then, it will make sense to organize early elections, terms of which will be agreed by the various parties based on a constructive cooperation.
For fourteen years and since 2007, Georgia has been chronically unstable, with people almost permanently protesting in the streets for a cause or another; this can only change through a real National Reconciliation that will finally take Georgians out of poverty and drive the country to a much needed prosperity.
