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Preliminary Statement by Independent Observer Public Alliance on parliamentary elections in Georgia

October 28, 2024

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The "Independent Observer" public alliance, represented by the "Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly - Vanadzor" and the "Union of Informed Citizens", carried out an observation mission during the Georgian parliamentary elections held on October 26 with a group of 18 observers.

Before the elections, the observers had meetings with the representatives of other observation missions accredited in Georgia and the leadership of the Central Election Administration of Georgia and observed the opposition rally held on October 20 and the "Georgian Dream" rally held on October 23.

Electronic devices for voter registration and ballot scanning were used for the first time in the elections. The Central Election Administration carried out extensive public awareness about it in Georgian, Armenian and Azerbaijani languages.

During the pre-election period and on the voting day, the mission received numerous credible reports on voter buying, use of administrative resources for voter intimidation, which was sometimes coupled with the collection of voter identification (ID) cards.

The mission noticed a number of steps taken by representatives of the "Georgian Dream" party and election commissions, which aimed to reduce the confidence of the voters in the secrecy of voting: starting from the shape and location of polling booths to the ruling party's installation of cameras at polling stations and spreading disinformation about other forms of controlling the vote.

On the voting day, 8 groups of mobile observers followed the process of voting and the tabulation of results in 54 polling stations in Tbilisi and regions (mainly in Samtskhe-Javakheti region). Violations of voting secrecy were observed in about 50 percent of the monitored polling stations, which were usually manifested by another person monitoring (monitoring) the voter's vote.

Against the background of warnings about voter impersonation with the collected identification cards, it was rather worrisome that in the polling centers observed, the observes widely recorded that the inking of voters' fingers (or checking the absence of ink on the fingers of incoming voters) was not done properly even in their presence (it should be noted that Inking of the voters' fingers with colorless ink visible under UV light is one of the main mechanisms to prevent double voting in Georgia.

At the same time, against the background of the widespread access to voters' passport data among representatives of the ruling party, it is even more worrying that the summary slips of the electronic registration devices do not record which voters' passport data were entered manually, instead of being read by the device. Data can be manually entered into the device without the presence of the voter and even without the presence of an identity document and can be used, for example, to vote for a person who is absent from the country.

In over 22 percent of the polling stations observed by the mission, crowds of people were observed at the entrance, which, as a rule, did not consist of voters, but supporters of political forces. These crowds included people who carried out campaigning, took the voters to the polling station, and identified voters who had not yet arrived at the polling station. Without exception, these individuals were authorized representatives of the Georgian Dream party or local observers who communicated about their affiliation with the ruling party.

Observers identified a lack of knowledge of legislation and procedures on the part of electoral commissions in most of the polling centers. This problem was particularly visible in rural areas.

About 20,000 local observers were accredited in the elections, but at the polling station it was often observed that persons with observer certificates presented themselves as representatives of the "Georgian Dream" and did not act neutral.

In a number of polling stations, observers saw that before entering the voting rooms the voters approached a Georgian Dream representative in the area, who made notes on his/her list.

During the observation, the activity of the observers was hindered in 3 polling stations. In the 22/4 polling station, our observer was physically assaulted when he tried to film the situation in the polling station. The mission was forced to cease monitoring at the site.

Taking into account the above-mentioned observations and the reports of other reliable observation missions, the Independent Observer Public Alliance has to state that the parliamentary elections of October 26, 2024 in Georgia were marred by significant violations, which overshadow the credibility of the election results.

"Independent Observer" Public Alliance

27.10.2024