Parliament Speaker: President’s initiative on holding “referendum on nation’s future” “not serious”

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Wednesday called President Salome Zourabichvili’s call for a “referendum on the nation’s future” on Tuesday “not serious” and “speculation”.

Papuashvili’s comments came after Zourabichvili on Tuesday issued a call for the referendum in response to the Parliament’s decision to override her veto on the controversial law on transparency of foreign influence.

This is not serious, this is speculation. They are removed not only from the will of the [public], but also from reality, and every time they receive the picture they received yesterday, they will again be frustrated and disappointed, because they are not acting in the interest of the people”, Papuashvili said in an apparent reference to both the President and the domestic opposition.

“The artificial plans that are sometimes drawn up [by them], that are whispered by their foreign patrons, turn out to be completely out of touch with the will of the Georgian people and reality”, he claimed.

The Parliament on Tuesday overrode the veto placed by the President on the law with 84 votes against four, on the backdrop of ongoing public protests.

The legislative body adopted the original version of the law, which requires registration of non-commercial legal entities and media outlets in the country as “pursuing the interests of a foreign power” if they derive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad.