The Oligarch's Next President
By Malkhaz Matsaberidze
Monday, December 9, 2024
The presidential candidate for Georgia's ruling party "Georgian Dream" will be former footballer Mikheil Kavelashvili. He will be elected by the Electoral College on December 14 and inaugurated on December 29. This decision was, of course, made by Bidzina Ivanishvili. Kavelashvili has been a member of parliament since 2016 and is best known for his sharply anti-Western stance.
For the first time this year, the president will not be elected by direct public vote but by the Electoral College. The Electoral College consists of 300 members, including 150 members of the Georgian Parliament, 20 members from Abkhazia's and 21 from Adjara's legislative bodies. The remaining 109 members are chosen proportionally by political parties based on local election results.
A presidential candidate can be nominated by at least 30 members of the Electoral College. In theory, the opposition could propose a candidate, but they have no chance of winning and are not planning to participate, as they consider the election illegitimate.
The ruling Georgian Dream party will have 156 members in the Electoral College (89 from parliament, 54 from local councils, and 13 from Adjara's legislative body), plus 20 members from Abkhazia's legislative body. Although Georgian Dream is unlikely to secure the required two-thirds majority of 200 votes in the first round, they are expected to win the second round, where a simple majority of 151 votes will suffice.
This marks the third time Bidzina Ivanishvili is hand-picking Georgia's president. His first choice was Giorgi Margvelashvili in 2013, but Ivanishvili and Georgian Dream were dissatisfied with his presidency. In 2018, they chose Salome Zourabichvili, requiring a second-round vote. Despite fierce opposition, she remained loyal to Georgia's pro-European constitutional course. Georgian Dream even attempted to impeach her but lacked the necessary votes.
By the end of 2024, Ivanishvili will be choosing the presidential candidate for the third time. This election is easier since the public no longer votes directly; the 300-member Electoral College, dominated by Georgian Dream, now decides.
As the election approached, speculation about Georgian Dream's candidate intensified. Some suggested Ivanishvili himself might run, arguing it would end rumors of shadow rule and grant him immunity. However, holding even a ceremonial position like the presidency would require public appearances, which Ivanishvili avoids. His current status-without any formal role or official responsibility-suits him better.
Other names were considered, including Georgia's first president's son, Konstantine Gamsakhurdia, former ministers Tea Tsulukiani and Irakli Gharibashvili, and former parliamentary speaker Archil Talakvadze. The main criterion was loyalty to Ivanishvili, though even Margvelashvili and Zourabichvili were initially seen as loyal.
In the end, Ivanishvili's choice of Mikheil Kavelashvili surprised the public. In 2015, Kavelashvili was barred from running for president of the Georgian Football Federation due to lacking a higher education diploma-a requirement he still does not meet. Responding to media questions, Georgian Dream's Mamuka Mdinaradze dismissed the issue, saying, "Loving your country doesn't require a diploma."
Kavelashvili, a three-term MP, is remembered for his offensive language, fights, and anti-Western statements. In 2022, he and two other MPs left Georgian Dream but remained in the parliamentary majority, forming the "People's Power" movement, claiming it would better inform the public. People's Power became Georgian Dream's primary vehicle for anti-Western propaganda, suggesting that Georgia was punished for not opening a second front against Russia, thus being denied EU candidate status in 2022.
In 2022, Kavelashvili published an open letter to then-U.S. Ambassador Kelly Degnan, accusing U.S.-funded actors of pushing Georgia into war, not Russia. This raised doubts about the letter's authenticity, prompting Kavelashvili to insist he wrote it himself. Ambassador Degnan dismissed the letter as full of lies, admitting she "couldn't even finish reading it."
The first draft of Georgia's controversial "foreign agent" law, targeting media and NGOs, also originated from People's Power. Though protests blocked the law initially, it was reintroduced and passed by parliament under Georgian Dream's sponsorship.
Opposition leaders see Kavelashvili's nomination as a complete discrediting of the presidency, reducing an already ceremonial role to an openly anti-Western figure. They argue that Ivanishvili's decision symbolically underscores Georgia's continued drift away from the West.