Ruling party MP offers fully majoritarian vote amid protests demanding fully proportional elections

 A ruling Georgian Dream (GD) majoritarian MP Dimitri Khundadze has offered the country to switch to a fully majoritarian electoral system amid protests in Tbilisi which were sparked by the rejection of the GD-proposed bill on the transition to a fully proportional electoral system from 2020.

Khundadze says that all types of electoral systems, fully proportional, fully majoritarian and a mixed, are democratic. However, “the world has acknowledged the advantage of the fully majoritarian electoral system.”

In the current reality of Georgia, when hundreds of political parties have nearly similar election programmes and platforms, the fully proportional electoral system is very likely to confuse voters,” Khundadze said.

Members of the ruling party say that they will not open discussions around the initiative.

Frequent changes to the country’s constitution is not acceptable,” former Parliament Speaker Irakli Kobakhidze said.

Demonstrations demanding a fully proportional electoral system continue in Tbilisi. Photo: Nino Alavidze/Agenda.ge. 

Ruling party MP Mamuka Mdinaradze says that the Georgian constitution reads the transition to a fully proportional electoral system starts in 2024 and “no more amendments are expected to take place in this regard.”

• The recent protests in Tbilisi were sparked after the reflection of the election bill last week, proposed by the ruling Georgian Dream party, offering the transition to a fully proportional electoral system from 2020 instead of 2024.
• The ruling party accepted the changes in the summer, during the June protests in Tbilisi, to calm crowds.
• As of now Georgia has a mixed electoral system with 77 seats in its 150-member parliament allocated proportionally under the party-list among parties or electoral blocs which clear a 5 per cent threshold in the race.
• The remaining 73 MPs are elected in 73 single-member districts, known as “majoritarian” mandates. A majoritarian MP candidate has to gain more than 50 per cent of votes to take a seat in the legislative body.
• The 2020 elections will be held with the help of the mixed-electoral system after the refection of the bill on November 14.