MPs’ public movement claims “disrespectful and crass attitude” to Georgian state institutions in US Embassy document on judicial reform

Popular Force, a recently launched public movement composed of former ruling Georgian Dream party MPs who exited the team in June, on Tuesday released a statement claiming “disrespectful and crass attitude” towards Georgian state institution in a United Sates Embassy document on the country’s judicial reform.

The authors of the statement said the document on the judicial reform, presented by the Embassy to the Georgian Parliament several days ago, “further supports” a viewpoint that efforts of the Embassy are aimed at “weakening” Georgian state institutions and strengthening the “radical opposition”.

The statement came from the movement involving the MPs who left GD following a disagreement over the public relations strategy with the rest of the faction, and alleged the document delivered by the Embassy to the Parliament contained a number of “problematic and absurd” instructions.

In the mentioned document, the word ‘should’ has been used 60 times, while the Embassy makes ‘recommendations’ to the Parliament on specific issues only nine times. Even this fact alone shows a completely disrespectful and crass attitude towards the Georgian sovereignty and state institutions. Such a document cannot be called ‘recommendations’, but only ‘instructions’, which, unfortunately, reminds us of the Soviet past and evokes corresponding grave associations”, the statement said.

The remarks from the movement also said the Embassy was free to “express its opinion” about Georgian legislation, however, “an embassy operating in a sovereign state and imbued with respect for sovereignty should limit itself to the aspect of justice in making recommendations, and should not interfere with expediency in any case”.

Unfortunately, over the past years, a vicious practice has been established, when the [US] Embassy representatives were in working groups and participated in the lawmaking process. Such a practice is completely unacceptable in a sovereign state, no matter how strategic the partnership between the two states is”, the statement noted. 

We will do our best to prevent this kind of practice in the future and the laws, in accordance with the principles of democracy and people's sovereignty, should be written only by the representatives of the state institutions that have been given the appropriate legitimacy based on the Georgian Constitution”, the statement said.

The members of Popular Force also noted the Embassy had requested the Parliament to change five constitutional norms that had “already been assessed as fair and flawless” by the Venice Commission, an advisory body of the Council of Europe.

This is also a manifestation of the disrespectful and crass attitude towards the state. The stability of the constitution is one of the main pillars of the stability of the state. When the Embassy constantly tries to force the Georgian Parliament to make changes to the Constitution, this once again makes us think that weakening the stability of the state is a kind of goal in itself for the Embassy”, the statement concluded.