Returns from all the precincts show ruling GDDG party with 48.67% of votes in the October 8 parliamentary elections, followed by opposition UNM party with 27.11%, according to early results from the Central Election Commission (CEC).
Election bloc, led by Alliance of Patriots of Georgia (APG), is just barely clearing 5% threshold by a margin of 113 votes, becoming a third party to enter new Parliament.
This, however, is not yet a final result and it may change as returns from several precincts are disputed and the election administration is reviewing complaints; results of party-list vote were annulled in six precincts as of Monday evening.
While change, if it happens, will have no significant influence on two major parties’ results in proportional, party-list vote, even a slight change may leave APG out of parliament.
As of late Monday evening CEC results showed APG with 88,109 votes, or 5.006%.
As the returns from the precincts were coming in, the Alliance of Patriots was slowly approaching the 5% threshold, reaching the mark briefly before again slipping just below the threshold to 4.99% on Sunday.
CEC stirred confusion earlier on Monday about APG’s vote share after its percentage was rounded by the election administration on its website to 5% while the number of votes cast for the party showed that its actual share of votes was 4.998%, meaning that it was not clearing the threshold.
Nationwide vote under the party-list, proportional system, determines distribution of 77 seats in the 150-member Parliament; remaining 73 MPs are elected in 73 single-member constituencies.
If the early result of elections stand, it will translate into the following distribution of 77 seats among the three parties: GDDG – 44 seats; UNM – 27 seats, Alliance of Patriots of Georgia – 6 seats.
According to the Georgian electoral law, if a party or an election bloc clears 5% threshold but it, under the proportional distribution of seats, translates into having less than 6 MPs, this party/bloc will anyway be eligible to 6 seats. This rule will apply to APG if its current vote share remains unchanged.
Fourth-placed Free Democrats, whose leader Irakli Alasania announced about “temporarily quitting” politics on Monday, received 4.62% of votes, falling short of the threshold.
Nino Burjanadze’s Democratic Movement has 3.53%, followed by State for People election bloc, led by opera singer Paata Burchuladze – 3.45%; Labor Party – 3.14%; Republican Party, led by speaker of outgoing parliament Davit Usupashvili – 1.55%.
Voter turnout was 51.63%.
On top of the 44 seats, which the ruling GDDG party, is expected to take in the Parliament under the proportional representation, its candidates are winning outright in majoritarian MP races in 23 single-mandate constituencies, according to preliminary results.
It means that the ruling party already has 67 seats in the new Parliament – 9 short of majority and 46 short of constitutional majority.
GDDG’s candidates are in the second round runoffs for majoritarian MP seats in 49 single-mandate-constituencies; in one constituency – Tbilisi’s Mtatsminda district, where the second round will also be held, GDDG had no its candidate; instead the party backed there independent candidate Salome Zourabichvili, who will face UNM’s Nika Rurua in the second round.
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