Even if Giorgi Vashadze’s the ‘Georgian party Civic Platform - the New Georgia’, ‘New Political Center Girchi (leader Zurab Japaridze) and Mamuka Katsitadze’s non-parliamentary party ‘New Right’ unite their efforts in the upcoming elections, they will hardly be able to reach 5% of the votes necessary to get into parliament . This an opinion of experts Giorgi Nodia and Peter Mamradze.
Georgian political analyst Giorgi Nodia expressed doubts that such an initiative will be a successful one. "This union is motivated by one reason only: since none of the parties have any chances to pass the 5% barrier, they thought that together they may be successful. But I doubt that together they receive more than 5%,’’ he said.
The expert explained that in general all three parties adhere to the pro-Western and liberal views, but there are some nuances – their voters are very different.
" Girchi is a libertarian party. They support free market and the legalization of light drugs. They are supported mainly by progressive youth," the analyst said.
"Vashadze's people are the former activists of the United National Movement, who like Saakashvili, but they do not really like the current leadership of the party, that is why they broke away due to subjective reasons,’’ he said.
"New Right" is not new. It is an old party. Primarily it is the party of businessmen, many of them were in Komsomol,’’ the analyst said.
According to the expert, it is difficult to make predictions, because, according to opinion polls, more than 50% of voters have not decided how vote. ‘‘Everything is possible, but I do not think that the new group has any chance to overcome the barrier," Giorgi Nodia concluded.
The head at the Institute of Management Strategy, Peter Mamradze, emphasized that the creation of electoral blocs is a routine phenomenon in Georgia.
"More than 200 parties were registered up to date and 28 of them are to take part in the elections. In fact, this is nothing but small associations of well-known individuals who think that they cannot get enough votes on their own, and hope to get into parliament by joining their efforts. But it is all in vain,’’ he said.
