There she was! Surrounded by the athletes, facing the crowd, and yet somehow alone in her white dress. On September 13, President Salome Zurabishvili hosted a public ceremony to generously distribute awards to those who contributed to Team Georgia’s successful performance at the Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games. But the event, held in front of the presidential Orbeliani Palace, was also a celebration of her quiet victories: weeks earlier, she had snubbed a government-organized closed-door event welcoming Olympic champions, insisting on making the celebration public and waiting until the Paralympics were over to include everyone. This helped portray the increasingly isolated government officials as fearful of public scorn – after they were booed on stage at similar public sports celebrations – and also made Zurabishvili look more inclusive.
But her own event, too, had its awkward moments. Among those she honored was the current Georgian Dream MP, who heads the Georgian Paralympic Committee. Two others on the award list – Olympic gold medalists – had only landed among GD’s top parliamentary candidates. The third champion, Lasha Bekauri, still plans to win more Olympic gold but made clear that he too was eyeing the same political career: immediately after receiving his award, he told journalists that he was “distancing himself” from the president, who Bekauri said was not worthy and… Orthodox Christian enough. And it was then that Bekauri, who loves nothing more than to be loved, found out that the President, too, was loved – and enough to turn the two-time Olympic champion overnight from hero to disgrace in the eyes of many. The scandal must have made Bekauri wonder: what’s so special about the lady who has done little but throw parties at her palace?
Here is Nini, and the Dispatch newsletter to tell about the greater purpose of a president’s party(ing) politics.
“I am inviting them both for lunch at 3 p.m. Until then, they can do whatever they want,” Zurabishvili quipped on September 17. The night before, she announced her intention to unite two opposition forces for elections—the Strong Georgia Alliance, led by Mamuka Khazaradze’s Lelo for Georgia, and the For Georgia party, led by ex-Prime Minister Giorgi Gakharia. She said she was ready to welcome their leaders at her Orbeliani palace the next day.
The Orbeliani Palace is a cozy spot in downtown Tbilisi, a historic building that combines modesty with nobility, perfectly suiting the incumbent president’s preferred aesthetic. After her election in 2018, Zurabishvili insisted on picking it over the more pompous and distant Avlabari residence, sending the latter to a mass grave of UNM-era buildings to indefinitely wait for reincarnation as some sort of a “hub,” just like the new-old parliament building in Kutaisi recently was. And ever since moving to the more accessible Orbeliani Palace, the figurehead president has been trying to turn it into a… well, hub, but the one for political change.
One can tell the story of Georgia’s recent years by recounting visits to the presidential palace. When polarization in Georgia reached its peak in the 2020-2021 elections, Zurabishvili tried to assume the role of a peacemaker among divided Georgians, introducing the idea of a “national accord”, repeatedly inviting representatives of various social and political groups, and even hosting the signing ceremony of the EU-brokered agreement. But all in vain: either Georgians didn’t trust and appreciate her enough, remembering well enough that she herself was elected in 2018 after a very polarized campaign and with GD endorsement, or simply since they didn’t feel the urgency to end the partisan bickering.
And by the time the country finally felt that “urgency,” GD had gone entirely rogue, the president had openly rebelled, and her popularity was skyrocketing by the day. So, Zurabishvili likely felt that the time had come for her to reassert her newfound authority (and work her aesthetic magic) to save the country from the worst. First, she proposed the “Georgian Charter” to give clearer direction to the upcoming October elections and allay the fears of those who feared the return of UNM rule. Now she wants more: a long-promised, illusive “third alternative” for apathetic voters who equally hate former and current ruling parties.
But they had moved on…
In our July enemies-to-lovers newsletter, we spoke about the old beef between Lelo’s Khazaradze and ex-PM Gakharia. We also wrote about how some were rooting for them to join forces before the elections in case one of them failed to get over the 5% threshold, but how it would take the President’s Deus Ex Machina to force them into an alliance by absolving them of the burden of their free will. This was especially true for Lelo, who wanted a “clean past” coalition and ran away from anything and anyone with a UNM or GD past. In such an alliance, there was hardly any place for the ex-PM, who loves nothing more than to own up to his controversial moves while in office, including a violent dispersal of the rally in 2019. But Zurabishvili chose not to intervene at that time and both forces went their own way.
And for a while, it looked like they were doing well. Lelo’s Strong Georgia coalition was growing, attracting niche popular forces. First came For People, led by Anna Dolidze, who stands out for her advocacy for social policies and for enrolling her young daughter in a public kindergarten. Then came Citizens, led by the fiery Aleko Elisashvili, also a former Khazaradze hater, who wins admiration by taking public transport and occasionally slapping those we don’t like. And since slapping around won’t be enough if they have to govern, the coalition also includes Freedom Square – a fresh-faced group of professionals and academics who decided to give politics a try when things got dire.
Gakharia ran largely on his own, but in recent weeks his support has apparently grown – if we trust social media and rumors, because in a fear-driven campaign environment, we don’t trust the polls (we trust the pollsters, but not the respondents. Sorry.). The ex-PM’s party has shown flexibility, including in promoting economic reforms such as minimum wages. The party has attracted some talented young people, and its members have appeared at various progressive rallies. And the leader’s macho charisma, ability to talk and connect with voters, and constant reminders of why he was once popular seem to be helping him. It looked like both Strong Georgia and For Georgia (don’t they rhyme so well?) were doing well and could both reach or exceed 10 percent in October. So why did the president decide to disrupt their comfort now?
‘Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself’
The campaign strategies of two forces may be enough to get them into parliament, but for the president, the stakes in October are too high to settle for some MP mandates. She wants guaranteed victory, and guaranteed victory may require an extra spark, a new framing: after all, isn’t hope a greater motivator than frustration?
Both For Georgia and Strong Georgia have positioned themselves as “neither GD nor UNM” forces. Many observers claim that there is some sort of “synergy” between their constituencies, and that offering their union as something bigger, stronger, the long-promised third-way alternative could be a sort of game changer that could win them additional undecided voters. Certainly, it may alienate some voters, especially those who liked Lelo for its relative “cleanliness” – some hate Gakharia for his sins, while others find it hard to believe that a man who enjoyed Bidzina Ivanishvili’s highest trust not so long ago is now completely estranged from his former boss.
On September 17, after a slight delay, both Khazaradze and Gakharia showed up for a dinner meeting at the Orbeliani Palace: saying no to the president is not considered good manners these days. Moreover, it may cost one votes (isn’t that fascinating, how political fortunes can turn?!). After the meeting, Gakharia hinted that he was in, while Khazaradze reportedly asked for another day to sort things out with his coalition partners. It seems that those from Freedom Square, whose main support may come from Tbilisi’s liberal bubble, are the most reluctant to lose their voters to a deal with the devil.
When thoughts are too much
While they are at it, the president will wait in her palace and binge-watch Netflix TV shows late into the night, as she admitted she does in her most recent interview. She told Lela Tsurtsumia, a famous Georgian pop singer and TV host, that this is how she unplugs when “thoughts are too much.” It’s probably also where she gets her inspiration for keeping the audience excited and interested. After all, a routine of throwing (tea) parties and inviting guests can be the most boring of all plots… unless you have some female genius author writing it for you.