Sichinava at Constitutional Court: Electoral Mood Cannot Be Grounds for Party Ban

Berdia Sichinava, representative of the party Gakharia for Georgia, responded at a Constitutional Court hearing to the allegations contained in the lawsuit filed by Georgian Dream deputies. According to him, electoral and political party moods cannot become grounds for declaring a party unconstitutional.

According to Sichinava, after the 2024 parliamentary elections the party Gakharia for Georgia did not make a decision to relinquish its mandates. He said that even if they had left the mandates, this is an act provided for by the Constitution and cannot become grounds for banning the party.

"The people's representative independently decides the scope of his authority in accordance with the Constitution and legislation. If this is an unconstitutional act, why did Georgian Dream support the termination of the mandates?!" Sichinava said.

According to him, the plaintiff's logic is based on the premise that after elections are held, everyone must consider that they were conducted in a free and fair environment, otherwise it is an unconstitutional act. Sichinava asked then why the law provides mechanisms for appealing election results at the precinct, district and Central Election Commission levels, followed by courts and international courts.

Sichinava noted that one of the principles of elections is secrecy of the ballot, and that the 2024 elections are being challenged at the European Court of Human Rights in terms of secrecy. He asked whether, if the Strasbourg court determines that secrecy, which is a fundamental principle of elections, was violated, it can be said that since the plaintiff considered the elections to have been held in a free and fair environment, it expresses the mood of the people.