TI Georgia: Runoff Held in Largely Peaceful Environment

Non-governmental organization Transparency International (TI) Georgia says the runoff of the October 28 Presidential elections was held in a “largely peaceful environment.”

The NGO’s final report about the second round of the elections also reads that the voting process was carried out without serious violations.

However, TI noted the Election Day showed new problematic trends related to alleged vote buying, violation of the secrecy of vote and registration of voters through unacceptable means.

TI 350 observers revealed 150 insignificant and relatively serious violations. In total, they filed 12 complaints.

“During the whole day, there was a visible mobilization of presidential candidate coordinators outside nearly all precincts, which created a tense atmosphere. Moreover, our observers noticed that most of them were standing outside with cars and people could be spotted getting in and out of the cars on a periodic basis. In four cases, according to our observers, the voters received money in the cars. In one more case, there was an alleged instance of vote-buying within the precinct,” the report reads.

Moreover, the NGO claims its observers witnessed, at 14 different precincts, instances of voters leaving the voting booth and showing their open ballot to a commission member, representative of an electoral subject or an observer.

“There was an observable trend of the queue moderator revealing the identity of voters to the observers. The moderators were either loudly saying the name and surname of the voter or dictating it to observers from different organizations. These actions could be perceived by the voters as an attempt to put pressure on them and to control their right to vote freely,” TI says.

Also, the NGO says there were two instances of interference in the work of journalists when journalists from TV Pirveli and news.on.ge were not allowed to record video material and an attempt was made to physically assault them

“In a number of precincts, the commission members didn’t let our observers properly observe the process of summarizing voting results. Our observers were expelled on a unsubstantiated basis from two precincts. Following the intervention of higher bodies of electoral commissions, our observers were allowed back into the precincts,” the organization said.

TI called on the Prosecutor’s Office to investigate all alleged attempts of vote buying. They also caled on the political parties to refrain from registering and mobilizing support through methods that can be perceived as restricting the free expression of the will of the voters.

By Thea Morrison