58% of Georgians Believe Judiciary "Under Ruling Party Control"

Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) Transparency International (TI) Georgia released the results of its public survey on May 11, according to which, 58% of the respondents believe that the judiciary is under the influence of the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party.

51% think that the judiciary is not impartial and 80% say that the judges who have been pressured into making unjust decisions in the past must not work in the judiciary.

As for the law enforcement bodies, the majority (57%) of respondents believe that the Prosecutor’s Office, Ministry of Internal Affairs (55%) and the State Security Service (55%) serve the interests of the ruling party.

Moreover, 36% responded that abuse of power for personal gain by public officials is common in Georgia, while 16% said that it is not common.

“Compared to other state institutions, public trust towards Parliament and the judiciary is significantly low as only 17% and 20% of the respondents trust them respectively,” the NGO stated.

Only 30% of the poll respondents have accurate information about the government optimization in 2017 regarding the reduction in the number of Ministries, and in the opinion of 61% of the poll respondents, the number of Ministries should be reduced further.

The survey was conducted by the Caucasus Research Resource Centers (CRRC). CRRC conducted 1843 face-to-face interviews with adult Georgians throughout the country March 3-28, 2018. The margin of error in the survey results is 2.8%.

The research covered issues related to corruption, trust towards state and public institutions, performance of the main bodies of the government, significant public policy issues, work of the media and non-governmental organizations.

By Thea Morrison