Ex-allies locked in bitter Georgian election battle

Both sides warn that their opponents will try to rig the vote on Monday, writes DANIEL McLAUGHLINin Tbilisi

NO GEORGIAN opposition figure seems able to end a discussion about Monday’s parliamentary election without the rueful admission: “You know, I used to be Misha’s friend and ally, but now . . .”

Georgian president Mikheil “Misha” Saakashvili is fighting hard for his party in the fiercest challenge of his political career, which comes from a coalition of former comrades led by a billionaire who helped bankroll his transformation of the country after the 2003 Rose Revolution.

Western monitors’ recent description of the campaign as “confrontational and rough” hardly does it justice.

Support for the ruling party appears to have been dented by footage aired by opposition channels of prison guards beating and sexually abusing inmates, in a scandal that government critics say exposes the rotten core behind the modern, democratic facade constructed by Saakashvili.

In response, pro-government stations have aired allegations that opposition members are plotting a coup, are in cahoots with mafia groups and are planning to “buy” vast numbers of votes.

Saakashvili’s United National Movement (UNM) and the Georgian Dream coalition led by the country’s richest man, Bidzina Ivanishvili, offer strikingly similar manifestos.

Both say they want to modernise Georgia, boost the economy and foreign investment, root out corruption and organised crime, and move their country of 4.5 million people down the road towards membership of the EU and Nato.

But the two parties are so implacably opposed to one another, and so bad is the blood between these former allies, that it is hard to imagine Monday’s vote passing off without protests.

Georgian Dream depicts Saakashvili as a dangerous autocrat surrounded by a shrinking clique of self-interested yes-men who will do anything to retain power.

The UNM, meanwhile, portrays Ivanishvili as a rich Kremlin puppet who wants to buy the election and restore the hegemony of Russia and organised crime groups over Georgia.

Both sides express utter confidence that they would win if Monday’s election were free and fair, but warn that their opponents will try to rig the ballot and claim an illegitimate victory.

No one here seems able to envision either side quietly accepting defeat and preparing to go into opposition next Tuesday.

Accusations and insults traded by the rivals have only intensified with the approach of polling day, and enmities are sharpened by feelings of old friendships betrayed and shared values abandoned.

“The messianism of Saakashvili, the belief that he is here to rescue the nation, coupled with corruption in the elites, has led his team to disaster,” said David Usupashvili, leader of a major party in the Georgian Dream alliance. “I was their good friend, personally and politically. We were in coalition in 2003 and were together in the Rose Revolution.

“But in June 2004 we went to the opposition because all these problems were already evident. In 2005 we said the way of Saakashvili was a new Bolshevism. People said at the time we were not serious or responsible. But not any more.”

Maia Panjikidze was Georgia’s ambassador to Germany and to the Netherlands under Saakashvili. Now she is the chief spokeswoman for Georgian Dream.

“It will be a very heavy step for them to accept defeat and leave power,” she said. “There is a desperate spirit among his supporters and his circle . . . In this environment it will be very difficult for him to take this step.”

Ivanishvili himself, a somewhat mysterious tycoon with a multimillion-euro collection of modern art and a space-age glass and steel residence on the hill overlooking the capital Tbilisi, says he funded many of Saakashvili’s early reforms and was his frequent behind-the-scenes adviser.

But he broke with Saakashvili after police used force to break up a 2007 demonstration.

“I was very angry then. I was calling him every minute and swearing at him,” the billionaire said recently.

Saakashvili defused the crisis by resigning, only to secure re-election shortly afterwards.

“He told me the lie that he was resigning because of my advice. In fact, the Americans pressurised him,” said Ivanishvili.

“The people have been deceived – including me.”

Saakashvili and his many supporters see things differently, of course.

They appreciate how he has brought Georgia into the western fold, helped its economy grow, overhauled the once notoriously corrupt traffic police and dotted Tbilisi and other cities with striking new buildings. They also fear the enigmatic Ivanishvili and a team of what they see as power-hungry former ministers and ambassadors.

Whatever happens in the days and weeks ahead, there is little chance of reconciliation between Saakashvili, Ivanishvili and their warring factions of former friends.

“The fish stinks from the head,” Ivanishvili said yesterday in typically blunt fashion.

“So we will take care of the head first.”