Shalva Kereselidze: The constitutional lawsuit indicates that “Georgian Dream” has made an open message that it does not intend to leave power even in 2028, for which it is ready to use all kinds of methods of struggle, acceptable or unacceptable

Ultimately, the constitutional lawsuit indicates that “Georgian Dream” has made an open message that it does not intend to leave power even in 2028, for which it is ready to use all kinds of methods of struggle, acceptable or unacceptable, – this was stated by Shalva Kereselidze, chairman of the parliamentary faction of the party “Gakharia for Georgia,” in the program “Day’s Newsroom.”

According to him, “Georgian Dream” wants to have the political field in Georgia completely cleared by 2028 and to appear before Georgian voters as an alternative-free political force, or to have political parties controlled by it.

“When it comes to banning a political party, in a civilized democratic state the authorities should not do this; society should do this during elections. On the one hand, the authorities say that these political parties do not have public support, and on the other hand they prepared a lawsuit and submitted it to the court in order to ban the parties. So what does this mean? They are so afraid of these opposition parties that they see serious risks and threats for the 2028 elections, that if these parties exist, they will actually have to give up power,” Shalva Kereselidze noted.

According to Shalva Kereselidze, there is no logic that the accusations presented in the lawsuit against the party “Gakharia for Georgia” are substantiated.

“When our representative Berdia Sichinava repeatedly asked what our political party was accused of, neither the representatives of ‘Dream’ nor the judges could give a proper and convincing argument.

When we enter into a discussion of specific accusations and ask what is substantiated, then everything is general and vague. It is clear that the judges are biased and they are fulfilling the order and assignment of the authorities. I think that the decision has already been made on how these court processes should end; the court decision is practically already written, it simply needs to be formally formalized, this procedural part and the holding of the sessions,” Shalva Kereselidze noted.

According to Shalva Kereselidze, the party “Gakharia for Georgia” does not intend to stop and plans to continue the fight, and as for participation in the processes, according to Kereselidze’s explanation, this is a way of respecting the voters and the law. According to him, participation in the court processes was even necessary for continuing the fight in Strasbourg.

“We still entered this court process because we respect our voters, we respect the law for the continuation of the future fight. We do not intend to stop, including through legal forms, also in the Strasbourg Court, for which participation in this process was even necessary. Therefore, as for leaving the mandates, let’s wait for the final decision of the Constitutional Court and, in accordance with the decision made by the Constitutional Court, we have our action plan according to which we will start acting,” Shalva Kereselidze noted.

In addition, Shalva Kereselidze also assessed the accelerated consideration of laws related to tariffs in Parliament and noted that with this decision, the fee for water and gas will increase equally for those in hardship, the socially vulnerable, and high-income strata.

“They boast that they increased citizens’ pensions by 45 lari instead of 20 lari, salaries in the public service are increasing by 8% or 10%, but in return they take away this increased pension and salaries twice over.

The logic of ‘Georgian Dream’ was that they were making corrections for socially vulnerable people, which is absolutely wrong; with this decision, electricity and gas will become more expensive for the society in socially difficult conditions, the middle class, and the high-income strata as well, because in Georgia there are very many such families that are employed, have low wages, and cannot make ends meet from month to month.

A multi-child family consumes more water, electricity, and natural gas – should you tax them? Instead of encouraging Georgian families? In Georgia there are very many highland settlements and, due to the climate, a family needs much more natural gas for heating. In several regions there are benefits, but elsewhere where there are none, what should they do? Leave their homes? In addition, the infrastructure in municipalities is out of order; how many municipalities, how many cities, and how many villages are there where there is no meter installed – will you tax them per capita and triple the fee? According to what principle do you intend to do all this? This is an unprepared and incorrect calculation,” Shalva Kereselidze noted.

As for the law related to gambling, Shalva Kereselidze states that tourism needs support and assistance, but not in this way. According to him, the state should help citizens in that direction and in creating those businesses that will be indirectly or directly related to tourism and will employ locals.

“When you do not want to do this and you go and bring world-class ‘players’ to Georgia and want to make them play here and ‘fatten them up’ for the sake of them supposedly staying in hotels, eating food, and spending money – this is a catastrophe and a horror. In Georgia we have cases when families die and fall apart because of gambling addiction; at this time you exempt this business from taxes and create greenhouse conditions for it. It’s as if you organize a drug festival in Georgia – very many tourists will come.

The Patriarchate had an immediate reaction on this issue, and I think such issues should be discussed together with the Patriarchate and not in an accelerated manner,” Shalva Kereselidze noted.

To the question of whether the accelerated adoption of this law is connected to someone’s business interests, Kereselidze answers yes, however, according to him, it will not be the interest of one person, and those involved include people from both the executive and legislative authorities and from Georgian Dream as well.

“Of course, the interests of representatives of the authorities and persons close to them, representatives of that clan who directly receive income from this business – this is a business that brings the highest profit, therefore instead of the authorities helping tourism, they completely ignore it and make corrections toward the other extreme, which brings harm and damage to the country.

Here it will not be the interest of one person; here there will be the interest of clan influences. They supposedly declared a fight against corruption when they arrested Gharibashvili and Liluashvili, but that was not really a fight against corruption, it was a fight for the redistribution of clan influences.

In Georgia, unfortunately, corruption has ‘taken root’ in every branch, both at the middle as well as the upper and lower levels. Direct instructions were received regarding this law, and a great many people will be involved here, both from the executive authorities, as well as from Parliament and from the ‘Dream’ team,” Shalva Kereselidze noted.