Georgians headed to the polls on Saturday in a pivotal parliamentary election that could determine whether the country shifts away from its long-held western orientations towards stronger ties with the Kremlin.
Voters will decide whether the Georgian Dream (GD) party, which has been in power since 2012 and steered the country into a conservative course away from the west and closer to Russia, secures another four-year term.
GD was founded by the shadowy billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, who made his fortune in Russia in the 1990s and is viewed by many friends and foes alike as Georgia’s most powerful figure even though he has not held public office for more than a decade.
Casting his vote on Saturday morning, Ivanishvili, whose wealth is estimated to be $7.5bn in a country whose GDP is $30bn, said the election was a choice between electing a government for “the Georgian people” and an “agent of a foreign country”.
GD has run its campaign on accusations that the pro-western opposition was trying to pull Georgia into a Ukraine-style conflict.
In 2008, Georgia – a country of 3.6 million people nestled in the Caucasus mountains – fought a war with Russia that lasted five days but left deep scars, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has left some in the country wary of the possible consequences of provoking Russia by moving closer to the west.
The party has also been accused by critics of plans to move the country into an authoritarian direction after Ivanishvili vowed to ban all major opposition parties and remove opposition lawmakers if his party was re-elected.
“The government is openly pledging to transform Georgia into a one-party state – a move unprecedented in modern Georgian history,” said Tina Khidasheli, the chair of the non-governmental organisation Civic Idea and a former defence minister.
Outside polling stations in central Tbilisi, some voters echoed this sentiment.
“This is the most important day in our modern history, the situation is very dangerous,” said Mariam Khvedelidze, a 23-year-old student who voted for Save Georgia, an opposition bloc centred around the party of Mikheil Saakashvili, the former president who is in prison on charges of abuse of power that his allies say are politically motivated.
Support for the pro-western opposition groups generally comes from urban and younger voters, who envision their political future with the EU.
“Our democracy and future in Europe is at stake. We can not become puppets of the Kremlin,” she added.
But other Georgians said they had voted for the ruling party, believing that it was the only force that could keep the country out of war with Russia.
“Right now, we need stability and friendly relations with Moscow,” said Elene Kiknadze, a 74-year-old pensioner.
Voting for GD, Kiknadze said, would also ensure Georgia would keep its “traditions,” referring to its conservative values, including opposition to rights for LGBTQ+ people.
“Let Europe have their freedoms. We don’t need gay parades in this country,” she added.
The ruling Georgian government, aligned with the deeply conservative and influential Orthodox church, has sought to galvanise anti-liberal sentiments by campaigning on “family values” and criticising what it portrays as western excesses.
In the summer, the parliament passed legislation imposing sweeping restrictions on LGBTQ+ rights, a move critics say mirrors laws enacted in neighbouring Russia, where authorities have implemented a series of repressive measures against sexual minorities.
Georgia’s notoriously divided opposition has attempted to unite by forming four pro-European blocs, which have all endorsed the Georgian charter, an initiative proposed by pro-western president, Salome Zourabichvili, urging them to prevent GD from forming a coalition and remaining in power.
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The four blocs have vowed to form a coalition government to oust GD from power and put Georgia back on track to join the EU.
“I am confident that Georgians will choose for the European future,” Tinatin Bokuchava, the leader of the biggest opposition party, United National Movement (UNM), said on Friday.
The EU granted Georgia candidate membership status last year but has put its application on hold in response to a controversial “foreign agents” bill that was passed in May requiring media and NGOs receiving more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as “agents of foreign influence”.
The bill, which triggered weeks of mass protests in the spring of this year, has been labelled a “Russian law” by critics, who liken it to legislation introduced by the Kremlin a decade earlier to silence political dissent in the media and elsewhere.
Independent NGOs have warned that GD will attempt to undermine the parliamentary elections, relying on their “administrative resources” – an umbrella term that includes pressing state employees to vote and offering cash handouts to mostly rural voters.
On Saturday morning, several videos circulated online appearing to show ballot stuffing and voter intimidation at various polling stations across the country.
“We are reporting dozens, if not hundreds of electoral violations taking place across the country,” UNM wrote on X.
Predicting the elections is hard, given the absence of reliable polling.
Surveys sponsored by the ruling party predict a landslide victory for GD while media sympathetic to the opposing sides have published rival polls, with pro-opposition broadcasters forecasting the ruling party will lose its majority.
Observers generally agree that GD will become the biggest party but might come short of claiming a majority, and struggle to form a government, with all other blocs refusing to collaborate with it.
The opposition has warned that the ruling party may attempt to manipulate the results, which could trigger mass protests, potentially followed by a harsh police crackdown.
“I certainly don’t expect Georgians to tolerate electoral fraud. People won’t stand by as their future is taken from them,” said opposition leader Bokuchava.