The Daily Dispatch – June 8

The Daily Dispatch is our editorial take on the past day’s news. You can subscribe here to get it in your mailbox. Click to write to us! We’d love to hear your ideas and opinions. Giorgi Tskhakaia has been scanning the news for you.

ONTO THE BANDWAGON Mamuka Khazaradze, former banking magnate, often positions his new LELO party as an alternative to upend the mud-slinging duopoly of Georgian politics. He did sound orthodox for a trailblazer though, when asked to comment on queer rights and state’s pre-election handouts to the Georgian Orthodox Church. Khazaradze said he had no qualms about GOC claiming swathes of forestland – so far state property – on flimsy grounds of their erstwhile ownership. He then conflated the rights of Georgia’s much abused queer community with gay marriage (which has not been high on that community’s agenda), arguing the minority rights should not be “forced upon the majority.” Incensed twitterring masses have harangued Khazaradze for embracing populism. One liberal scion – Lasha Bakradze – even cut himself loose from LELO. Mr. Khazaradze maybe right in thinking that kowtowing to the Church and railing against the oppressive minorities is in vogue, but he might learn that flip-flopping never is.

FULL TO THE BRIM Famously fertile Georgian soil has borne political fruit again. Several MPs, who were initially elected on the slate of Georgian Dream and then jumped ship set up a new political faction today. Egged on by the perspective of minute electoral threshold (only 1 % of votes if March 8 deal gets a go-ahead), many other politicos are expected to follow suit. Bereft of financial muscle and popular outreach, can they reap rich enough harvest of votes when polls are held this autumn? We shall see. Did not venerable Dr. Darwin preach the survival of the fittest?

OPPOSITION STICKS TO ITS GUNS A dozen or so political parties, who previously partook in brokering an agreement on electoral change in Georgia, have said immediate release of Giorgi Rurua, a shareholder of opposition-minded Mtavari Arkhi TV, is a precondition for going ahead with the deal. The group says Rurua was detained on trumped up charges and maintains that the ruling party had committed itself to setting free all “political prisoners”. The Georgian Dream argues no such deal was made. In the meantime, as if by accident, stories started cropping up in the media sympathetic to the ruling party about Mr. Rurua’s alleged criminal past in stormy 90s, linking him to a terrible double-murder.

And finally, most of GEORGIA REOPENS: With less than 114 active Covid-19 cases many agree that Georgia is ready to open up after a lengthy, stifling lock-down. Intercity transportation has resumed. A great many bars and restaurants, which have already reopened indoor spaces, are bustling with life. A recently circulated image – showing spellbound customers lined up in front of trendy Fabrika watering hole – offers a glimpse of post-covid state of affairs in Tbilisi. As often, Georgia’s social media split down the middle: moralists taking lax party-animals to account of being as lax as the religious faithful were when it comes to crowding their favorite places of worship, others glorifying undying thirst for much-cherished freedom. Let’s just hope Georgia’s luck with epidemic sticks…

That’s full lid for today!