The PPP (Peculiar Political Process) in Georgia

Op-Ed

Here is a newly coined term and an abbreviation thereto, graphically describing Georgian politics! I have learnt in my salad years that economy is the blood circulation of our physical world and politics is its nervous system, and the world’s health is in direct proportion to the salubrious interaction between those two vital systems. Georgia, like any other nation on earth, is a micro-model of the world and the quality of its welfare fits well into this model of the world’s existence.

One does not need to have a special academic qualification to know that the current political process in Georgia has its curiously sinuous ups and downs, often expressed in barefaced political incriminations which repeatedly become verbal altercations and even corporeal squabbles between the malcontents in the country’s legislative stronghold.

The most salient characteristic feature of the PPP in Georgia is its overwhelming anxiety and jumpiness, fed by the ever-present inter-party sense of intolerance between political colleagues, and not only that: intra-party bigotry is also commonplace. Georgia’s PPP has politicized the life of the country with the help of the powerful tool of television. Even the loaf of bread you buy at the baker’s smells like politics. Society is politically overcharged, leading to the impression that the only product we produce is politics and the only food we eat is politics.

But being politically obsessed does not mean that politics works well in this country. Generally speaking, the entire PPP lacks political logic, firmness of strategy and farsighted planning. One of the main actors of the PPP, the ruling party, has been doing its job in the last seven years very confidently; overpowering the opposition in many ways, including every possible electoral event that has taken place since 2012, when the long-awaited radical political change sounded deafeningly nation- and world-wide.

I have a habit of listening to every participant in the PPP, thus enabling myself to make affordably reasonable conclusions out of what I hear, and my updated inkling is that the ruling party has given myriad reasons for the opposing side to voice harsh criticism, but the opposition has returned instead with insubstantial reaction to the weaknesses the rulers feed them every so often. In a word, the opposition makes itself sound banal and trivial, never coming up with rejuvenated images or fresh ideas; all their actions and theoretical seizures are as old as the hills and as boring as beans.

Today, the PPP is not very interesting a show to watch because it lacks thrill, luster and narrative. Naturally, any functioning opposition tries to make a change: this is their sacred goal, and it makes sense and justifies their pecuniary effort and existence, so to speak. But the change will occur only if it matures in the depths of the political process, mostly occupied by its Excellency the electorate, reflecting the success of a social movement.

In the notable year of 2012, the then-extant governmental system suffered a considerable number of grave vulnerabilities, caused for various minor or major reasons, which triggered the opportunity for interference in the political process, and change was executed as a result. Understandably, change will not happen if the political opportunities are not in place. Currently, the political opportunities are not yet mature enough to instigate the readiness of the masses for change, and the corroboration of this is the balanced and reserved behavior of social movement in Georgia, which should promote thoughts and actions conducive to change. The opposition to the current government is against anything the government does, and they have no idea how dubious the electorate’s reaction to their discourse is, claiming but not achieving the goal of persuasive description of persisting problems, repeatedly articulating the reasons for change with the same stale vocabulary and uneasy zest.

The current social movement in Georgia demonstrates almost no series of protest, and if there are any from time to time, they are neither long nor strong enough to lead society into a change-oriented deliberation. Do we see any serious strikes, demonstrations, protests and petitions around? Well, part of the population feels disadvantaged and ill-treated, nursing certain complaints directed at the current regime which they reckon unfair, but the overall sense of injustice is not yet developed enough, compared to 2012, to build the motivation for change.

Any government is subject to some vulnerability to the challenges of the time of their rule, but the current Georgian government has not yet created a forceful enough political opportunity for its opposition to be able to talk the larger part of our public into introducing any radical change. Among the reasons for this would figure potent ingredients like political pluralism, behavioral liberation, uncurbed freedom of media, absence of repression, and so on and on and on.

By Nugzar B. Ruhadze