Former Ruling Party Lawmaker Leaves MP Mandate

Georgian lawmaker Sofio Katsarava who quit the parliamentary majority over the ruling party’s failure to adopt promised constitutional amendment on Thursday, announced today that she is leaving her MP mandate.

Katsarava, who served as the chairperson of the Foreign Relations Committee until Thursday, wrote on her Facebook page that “I have made a very difficult decision today – but from my point of view, this is the only right decision – to leave the parliamentary mandate.”

Katsarava is one of the twelve MPs who quit the ruling party and parliamentary positions after the parliament of Georgia has voted down the constitutional amendment envisaging transition to fully proportional electoral system from 2020 instead of 2024.

While all of 44 MPs of opposition parties supported the bill, ruling Georgian Dream’s three lawmakers voted against the amendment and 37 abstained, making the bill fall short of the needed 113 votes, three fourths of sitting 150 MPs.

With the failure to pass the amendment, the ruling Georgian Dream party has backtracked on one of its key commitments to Tbilisi protests in June. Katsarava, along with several other MPs that left the ruling party, were Georgian Dream’s key interlocutors with the West.

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