2020: Life in Crisis
By Malkhaz Matsaberidze
Wednesday, January 6
2020 has proved to be extremely difficult - the Covid-19 pandemic closed borders, stagnated the already crisis-ridden economy, catastrophically increased foreign debt, and impoverished the population. All of this is accompanied by the acute political crisis created after the October 31 parliamentary elections. It would be good to let all this go with 2020, but unfortunately, this legacy is taken by 2021, and today it is difficult to say that next year will really be able to pull the country out of the crisis.
The strict quarantine regime was continued on January 3 while the Covid-19 epidemic continues in full force. 2020 has become the year of the coronavirus pandemic all over the world and in Georgia. The first case of the virus in Georgia was recorded on February 26, 2020 and when the number of infected reached 47, strict quarantine was introduced in the country. The first wave of the pandemic, which hit many countries of the world, passed very easily for Georgia, it was immediately said that a second wave was expected in the fall, but virtually no one expected the severity of this wave. In a country of 3.7 million, the number of infected people exceeded 220,000 by the end of December, and the death toll was more than 2,350.
The pandemic will not only continue in 2021, but also the third wave is expected by the end of February. So far no encouraging statements have been made about the start of vaccinating the population. The scale of the epidemic and the problems associated with it have long caused serious dissatisfaction among the population. The pandemic and related constraints have dealt a severe blow to the country's economy, according to preliminary data, the country's economy will shrink by 5.1% in 2020 and, in fact, tourism - the leading sector of the country's economy - has died.
In 2020, the country's external debt amounted to 30.68 billion GEL, of this, 6 billion is domestic debt, and 24.6 billion in foreign debt in 2016-2019 was about 41% of GDP, and by the end of 2020, this figure has reached a critical level of 60%. The lari has depreciated sharply - by 10% against the dollar in 2020.
The main event of 2020 for the domestic political life of the country was the October 31 parliamentary elections. A major controversy erupted between the government and the opposition over the terms of the election earlier this year. A March 8 agreement was reached through the mediation of the ambassadors of the United States and the European Union, by which the country moved towards proportional elections. In the 150-member parliament, 120 were elected by proportional and 30 by majority. The opposition has been fighting for proportional elections for a long time, since Saakashvili's rule, when the National Movement was in power. However, this change alone was not enough to change the government.
The Georgian Dream achieved exactly the results of the elections that were necessary for it to stay in power for a third term and form an independent government. The 60 seats won by the 8 opposition parties sound impressive at first glance, but within parliament they can have no real impact on either the Georgian Dream's domestic or foreign policy, especially since the Georgian Dream did not impose a 1% threshold in vain - many different parties were hit in the parliament.
After the elections, the domestic political developments in November-December were clearly unexpected for the government. All opposition parties were unanimous in their assessment of the October 31 elections - in their view, the elections were totally rigged and all opposition parties in parliament boycotted the 10th convocation parliament. The opposition demands early parliamentary elections, and the government categorically rejects this demand and tries to crack down on the opposition, agreeing to allow some opposition members to enter parliament through threats or promises. Georgian Dream immediately revised the law on state funding of parties, and those opposition parties that do not enter parliament will not receive funding.
The pro-Western opposition claims that the Georgian Dream government is pushing the country towards dictatorship and that democratic gains are being lost. The opposition hopes for the West. At the beginning of the year, the United States and the European Parliament sent a series of critical letters to the "Georgian government", but then this criticism was effectively stopped and the opposition protest against the rigging of the October 31 elections did not provoke a strong reaction from the West.
Facilitators advise the opposition to enter parliament. In such a situation, some even claim that the Georgian Dream lobbyists have "settled relations" with the West. Meanwhile, a major geopolitical change took place in the Caucasus, with Azerbaijan's war with Armenia ending in the restoration of Azerbaijan's territorial integrity, although it agreed to deploy Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh, leaving those parts of Nagorno-Karabakh in Armenian hands.
The President of Turkey initiated to create a Caucasian Peace Platform. In fact, it is an attempt to expel the West from the South Caucasus. That is why the President of Georgia happily approved the idea of creating such a platform.
Both the Georgian government and the West will have to reassess their interests in the new reality. All this is already about 2021.
(Translated from Georgian by Mariam Mchedlidze)
