Georgia parliament elects West critic Kavelashvili as president

Mikheil Kavelashvili’s presidency is seen as a shift in Georgia’s policies. (Photo/AFP)

Georgian lawmakers elected Mikheil Kavelashvili, a hardline critic of the West, as president on Saturday, setting him up to replace a pro-Western incumbent amid major protests against the government over a halt to the country’s European Union accession talks last month.

Kavelashvili, a former professional football player, has repeatedly said that Western intelligence agencies are seeking to drive Georgia into war with Russia, which ruled Georgia for 200 years until 1991.

Hundreds of protesters gathered in light snowfall outside parliament ahead of the presidential vote. Some played football in the street outside and waved red cards at the parliament building, a mocking reference to Kavelashvili’s sporting career.

Protester Vezi Kokhodze described the vote as "treason" against what he said was Georgians' desire to integrate with the West.

Georgian presidents are picked by a college of electors composed of MPs and representatives of local government. Of 225 electors present, 224 voted for Kavelashvili, who was the only candidate nominated.

Boycotted parliament

All opposition parties have boycotted parliament since an October election in which official results gave Georgian Dream almost 54 percent of the vote, but which the opposition say was fraudulent.

Kavelashvili was nominated for the mostly ceremonial presidency last month by Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire ex-prime minister who is widely seen as the country’s paramount leader and has moved to deepen ties with neighbouring Russia, which polls show many Georgians dislike.

Kavelashvili is a leader of People’s Power, a splinter group of the ruling party, and was a co-author of a law on “foreign agents” that requires organisations receiving more than 20 percent of their funding from overseas to register as agents of foreign influence and imposes heavy fines for violations.

'Mockery of democracy'

Outgoing President Salome Zourabichvili, a former French national and a pro-EU critic of the ruling Georgian Dream party, has positioned herself as a leader of the protest movement and has said she will remain president after her term ends. She considers parliament illegitimate as a result of alleged fraud in the October election.

In a post on X shortly before the vote, Zourabichvili said her successor's election represented "a mockery of democracy".

Opposition parties have said they will continue to regard Zourabichvili as the legitimate president, even after Kavelashvili is inaugurated on December 29.

At a briefing after the vote, Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze congratulated Kavelashvili, and referred to the outgoing president as an "agent" of unspecified foreign powers.

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Source: TRT