British candidate in Georgian elections takes down posters, inspires others
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A British man who moved to Georgia five years ago not only actively got involved in Georgian political life this election season but has also demonstrated a great deal of political responsibility to local politicians.
Originally from London and holding a Georgian passport, Joseph Alexander Smith has become the first ‘foreigner’ to participate in Georgian municipal elections; he ran in Saturday’s municipal elections for a seat in the Tbilisi City Assembly.
Although Smith, 32, did not win the race, he had the whole city impressed by what he did the next day of the elections. He cleaned the walls of the city from his election posters – a rare sight to see in the immediate days after elections in the country.
Joseph Alexander Smith takes down his election posters a day after the elections. Photo source: On.ge
"The elections are over and taking our election posters off is our political and civic responsibility”, Smith said in a video address he posted on Facebook.
He urged other candidates to take their posters off the walls as well to make sure the city looks the same as it did before the elections.
Apparently, Smith’s move turned out to be motivational to other political players as well; the next day the ruling Georgian Dream party’s press office also announced they would clean the city from their election posters.
According to the preliminary election results, Smith took third place, gaining 14.04 percent of votes in his majoritarian district.
He said this was "quite an achievement” for him and his team, considering the fact that a couple of months ago almost no one in the district knew about them and also they had very limited financial resources.
Fundamental freedoms were generally respected in the October 21 municipal elections in Georgia, and candidates were able to campaign freely. This was stated in the preliminary assessment of the elections released this afternoon by two international observing missions.
Georgia has once again proved it is part of democratic world and a member of the European family, ruling Georgian Dream party’s candidate Kakha Kaladze said at today’s briefing.
Ruling Georgian Dream party’s candidate Kakha Kaladze appears to be winning the mayoral race in capital Tbilisi. The Central Election Commission (CEC) released preliminary results of the Municipal Elections 2017.
The Central Election Commission (CEC) of Georgia released latest voter turnout figures a short time ago and the data showed 1,569,992 people voted today. This was 45.64 percent turnout.
The Embassy of the United States (US) congratulates the Government and people of Georgia on Saturday’s well-administered municipal elections. The embassy said in a statement yesterday that the elections were held in a largely peaceful environment and respected fundamental freedoms.
The ruling Georgian Dream candidate Kakha Kaladze has won Tbilisi mayoral elections, according to the preliminary data from the Central Election Commission (CEC). The CEC preliminary results say that Kaladze received 51.1 percent of total votes.
The opposition United National Movement party is refusing to participate in the second round of the municipal elections. Yesterday, the party’s political council held a meeting to discuss the issue and announced their decision not to run in the election runoff.
Georgian police are investigating an incident during which a car belonging to an NGO member exploded as the owner was leaving the election headquarters of one of the candidates late last night.
Transparency International (TI) Georgia and International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED) say violent posters in the streets of Tbilisi pose a threat to the health and life of the opposition and media representatives.