Parliament Speaker claims domestic opposition “paradox” in holding rally to “demand less sovereignty”

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Thursday claimed the domestic opposition had engaged in a “paradox” by holding a public protest in capital Tbilisi this week to “demand less sovereignty”, in comments on the rallies against the controversial bill on transparency of foreign influence.

Papuashvili contrasted his claim with historical events of protests being held on Rustaveli Avenue in the city in the early 1990s with demands for the country’s independence from the Soviet Union, adding “these days the opposition and its NGOs are gathering people to demand less sovereignty”.

In his remarks over the bill, which calls for 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, the lawmaker said the adoption of the law was a “long process”, adding “everyone will have the opportunity to present their arguments”.

It is a paradox to bring people to the point of saying that they should have as little information as possible, that a lot of information seems to them to be bad and harmful. The non-governmental organisation sector has reached this paradox and this situation has led us to this paradox”, Papuashvili said.

“In terms of international responses [to the bill], we have seen one thing that the propaganda of the so-called ‘Russian law’ has failed. None of the responses contain such terminology, which was unfortunately established by one of the [foreign] diplomats last year. This propaganda of the ‘Russian law’ has failed”, he alleged in reference to the term used by those against the legislative piece.

The Georgian Parliament on Wednesday approved the first reading of the bill on the backdrop of public protests and criticism by some of the country’s foreign partners.

The legislative piece was supported by 83 MPs in the 150-member lawmaking body.