Fri, May 03, 2024 page9

• Georgia at political crossroads as ‘foreign agent’ bill draws protests

  The ruling party says the bill is necessary to promote transparency among non-governmental organizations and to combat what it calls ‘pseudo-liberal values’ imposed by foreigners

  • By Felix Light / Reuters, TBILISI
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  Georgia faces more protests this week as lawmakers resume debate on a “foreign agents” bill that opponents denounce as a Russian-inspired tool to crack down on freedom of speech.

  The bill would force organizations receiving more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad to register as foreign agents, a term that carries connotations of spying.

  It has ignited a political crisis in the polarized South Caucasus nation, which has hopes of joining the EU and was awarded EU candidate status in December last year.

  

  Illustration: Mountain People

  The EU has repeatedly said the bill — which lawmakers on Wednesday approved in a second reading — is a threat to those ambitions.

  The UK and US have also opposed the bill, while Hungary and Russia have defended it.

  Thousands of people protested against the bill for days when it passed its first hurdle in parliament last month. Since then, students have been shutting down Tbilisi’s main avenue on a nightly basis, facing off against riot police.

  Local media have cited a senior ruling party official as saying the party was helping with costs and laying on transport so its supporters could attend the demonstration in the capital, while insisting they would only be there of their own volition.

  The government on April 4 said it was reintroducing the foreign agents bill to parliament, after abandoning it last year following protests.

  “Georgia is at a crossroads now, and the outcome of these rallies and these parliamentary elections will decide where Georgia will be heading for the next few years,” said Kornely Kakachia, head of the Georgian Institute of Politics think tank. “It seems like Georgia is now between authoritarianism and the potential to become part of Europe.”

  Georgia’s opposition has dubbed the bill “the Russian law,” comparing it to similar legislation that the Kremlin has used to suppress dissent.

  Georgia, once part of the Soviet Union, has struggled to define its place between Russia and Europe in the turbulent three decades since the collapse of the former superpower. It lost a short war against Russia in 2008.

  Kakachia said the coming weeks could be crucial to its future.

  He said there is a growing sense among the Georgian public, who polls show overwhelmingly support EU integration, that the ruling Georgian Dream party no longer represented their interests, but those of its influential founder, billionaire former Georgian prime minister Bidzina Ivanishvili.

  Georgian Dream and its allies say that the foreign agent bill is necessary to promote transparency among non-governmental organizations and to combat what they call “pseudo-liberal values” imposed by foreigners.

  Rati Ionatamishvili, a Georgian Dream lawmaker and head of parliament’s human rights committee, said the bill would protect democracy by providing for “high standards of transparency.”

  Despite the negative reaction from the EU and other Western nations, Ionatamishvili said the law would bring Georgia’s EU accession closer. He did not specify how, but said Western nations had failed to substantiate their criticisms.

  Tensions on the street have occasionally boiled over into brawling in Georgia’s often-rowdy parliament. During committee hearings on the bill on April 15, opposition lawmaker Aleko Elisashvili tore across the floor of the chamber and punched Georgian Dream faction leader Mamuka Mdinaradze in the face.

  In an interview with Reuters, Elisashvili compared ruling party lawmakers to Georgians who joined Lenin’s Bolsheviks after Soviet forces took control of their nation in 1921 following a brief spell of independence.

  “I looked at those traitors standing at the parliamentary dispatch box and couldn’t hold myself back any more,” he said.

  Now joining the protesters outside parliament nightly, Elisashvili believes that the situation is ripe for the government’s ouster, along the lines of Georgia’s 2003 Rose Revolution.

  “If the government had even an ounce of brains and wisdom they would drop this bill, the situation would calm down and they could make it to the elections, but whatever happens, these people will not stay in power,” he said.
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