Georgia is in the midst of a tense campaign for its October parliamentary election that is increasingly reminiscent of a nasty battle between two rival corporations for market share, with plenty of legal fights thrown in for good measure.
In one corner is the ruling United National Movement, whose boss, President Mikheil Saakashvili, claimed yesterday in Brussels that "[t]here are cheap attempts to buy the votes of our people like sheep, with the money coming from one country."
In the other corner is billionaire opposition leader Bidzina Ivanishvili, the unspoken target of Saakashvili's comment. (Russia, making its umpteenth alleged appearance in a Georgian political drama, was the unnamed country.)
But neither the supposed attempts at vote buying nor the penalties imposed for them are actually cheap.
On June 27, Ivanishvili?s Georgia Dream coalition was handed a 2.38-million-lari (about $1.49 million) fine for having a private company affiliated with the billionaire spruce up the offices of coalition parties for free. Earlier on, the police impounded Ivanishvili's shares in two Georgian banks and one property-development company? after he refused to pay a mega-million-lari penalty for alleged attempts to bribe voters with free satellite antennas. ( Ivanishvili, who has appealed the fines, maintains that he doesn't own the shares in question.)?
Transparency International Georgia argues that the seizure of the antennas is illegal, and that the court rulings on Ivanishvili's case have been unfounded.*
In the meantime, the coalition's failure to pay the campaign-finance fines may lead to the seizure of the assets of the Georgian Dream's six party-members -- not a particularly deep-pocketed crowd -- as well. Coalition members have described the fines as extortion and expressed hope that international pressure will discourage the Georgian government from, in their words, bankrupting opposition parties.
The European Union has expressed concern about the "polarization" afoot, while outgoing US Ambassador John Bass today underlined the importance that "all parties have an opportunity to compete" in the election, but neither has gotten into the nitty-gritty of Georgia's campaign-finance rules. ??
The Saakashvili administration, meanwhile, portrays its battle with Ivanishvili as a fight with Georgia's main national enemy, Russia. Saakashvili and his entourage claim that Ivanishvili, who made his fortune in Russia, serves the Kremlin?s interests.
But that's an argument Georgians have heard before -- in fact, every time that the ruling elite have faced a potent political challenge.
For now, Ivanishvili has no plans to stop spending his money, leaving local observers to bet that more multi-million-lari fines are in the cards.?
*Transparency International Georgia and the Georgian Young Lawyers Association receive funding from the Open Society Foundation Georgia, part of the Open Society Foundations network. EurasiaNet.org operates under the auspices of the Central Eurasia Project, a separate part of that network.
Source: http://www.eurasianet.org/node/65613
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