Election 2014: Promises made, but few are kept

The June 15, 2014 local elections are approaching. The population already knows the names of the candidates for the mayors from different parties. The list of the election participants is also known. Analysts observe that in most of the cases, the promises candidates give are almost the same. All of them give promises with regard to social benefits, lowering the cost of utility services, and an overall decrease on goods. And all of them promise to restore justice.

All candidates promise they will improve the quality of life and living standards so that everything goes according to the traditional scenario. Politicians give wide and generous promises before the elections, which unfortunately they forget after they are elected.

In many cases, they are unable to fulfill their promises or think that there is no need to fulfill them. There are some paradoxical cases as well.

When the Georgian Dream coalition was coming to power in 2012, it promised to decrease prices on fuel, natural gas, and electricity. The United National Movement (UNM) meanwhile, insisted that this was not possible.

The Georgian Dream managed to decrease prices only in very few directions when they took office. In reality the coalition managed to decrease tariffs on certain items by several tetris saying that it is impossible to bring down the prices.

Paradoxically enough, today the former administration also promises to decrease tariffs as part of their election campaign. However, they promise to do so now – while being in the opposition.

Some analysts ask, if the UNM can decrease the prices now on the items established during their governance, it means that the prices on those particular items were increased deliberately.

Very often, the promises given by the candidates lie beyond their competence. For instance, how can the mayor of a city influence the price of oil products, a resource that is determined by world markets? Prices should not be artificially increased.

Of course, the election participants target their messages at low-income families. This is the constituency that represents a large portion of the electorate.

So the scenario repeats again and again: politicians give generous promises, but rarely are their any tangible results.

The analysts observe intensive exploitation of administrative resources from the Georgian Dream coalition. Although Vise Prime Minister Kakhi Kaladze has publicly announced that no administrative resources will be used by the coalition, the opposition challenges this approach.

Kaladze says that the ruling team does not need to use additional anti-constitutional efforts. He reiterated that for abusing the law in this direction, political parties should pay big penalties.