EditHuman rights activists warn: Georgia is slipping toward a one-party future
Once the post-Soviet beacon of reform, Georgia now strips opposition parties of their political rights - for life
The human rights organisation Transparency International Georgia called “incompatible with the Constitution of Georgia” a legislative package that enables the prohibition of political parties and the indefinite deprivation of political rights for individuals associated with them.
Georgia’s parliament, controlled by the ruling Georgian Dream, rushed through on 16 October a package of amendments that empower the Constitutional Court to dissolve political parties and strip individuals linked to them of their political rights for life.
Three days after the bills were registered, they became law – passed in three readings with no meaningful debate.
Shalva Papuashvili, the parliamentary speaker and a senior Georgian Dream figure, promptly announced that the government would ask the Court to outlaw the country’s three largest opposition blocs: the Coalition for Change, the United National Movement (founded by former president Mikheil Saakashvili), and the Strong Georgia alliance. Up to ten parties could eventually face the same fate, party leaders have warned, while a separate list is being drawn up of “associated persons” who will be barred from public life.
Transparency International Georgia stated that these amendments are not merely procedural tweaks – they are a deliberate assault on political pluralism. The law offers no definition of who qualifies as “associated” with a banned party, leaving the door open to arbitrary persecution of anyone the ruling party dislikes.
Individuals so labelled will be forbidden from founding or leading parties, joining any party, standing in elections, holding public office, or even making political donations. Elected representatives from banned parties will lose their seats instantly, and the parties’ electoral lists will be voided. Former members of dissolved parties will be prohibited from forming new ones or joining existing ones, yet the law is silent on how many such individuals would trigger a fresh ban – whether one would suffice, or dozens. Most chillingly, these restrictions have no expiry date and no mechanism for review.
According to the NGO, the haste and opacity of the process violate every norm of democratic law-making. International standards demand that legislation of such gravity be drafted transparently, debated thoroughly, and subjected to rigorous legal scrutiny. Instead, Georgian Dream has engineered a legal weapon that can be wielded at will against any opponent.
A pattern of erosion
These amendments build on two earlier changes enacted earlier in 2025. The first lowered the threshold for banning a party to the point where it is enough to show that its goals, activities, or personnel “substantially repeat” those of a previously banned organisation.
The second imposed draconian deadlines on the Constitutional Court: nine months for standard cases, a mere fourteen days for parties deemed “similar” to one already dissolved. Everyone in Georgia knows the Court routinely takes years to decide constitutional complaints; compressing complex political cases into a fortnight is a mockery of due process.
Both earlier amendments are themselves constitutionally suspect. The first is so vague – “declared goal,” “essence of activities,” “personal composition”, that it flouts the principle of legal certainty enshrined in Georgia’s own Constitution. Citizens must be able to predict what conduct will trigger sanctions; here, the rules are a blank cheque for the powerful. The second amendment offends the right to a fair hearing guaranteed by Article 31. No impartial court can deliver a reasoned judgment on the fate of an entire political movement in two weeks.
Constitutional overreach
The October package, indicates the organisation, compounds these flaws with a direct assault on the Constitution’s separation of powers. Article 60 exhaustively lists the Constitutional Court’s jurisdiction; banning individuals from political life is not among its powers.
The Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association has warned that any attempt by the Court to enforce these personal prohibitions would exceed its mandate and undermine the very Constitution it is meant to protect.
Nor does any substantive constitutional provision authorise such measures. Article 23 permits the banning of parties that seek violent overthrow of the state or incite hatred, but says nothing about punishing their members afterwards. Article 24 restricts electoral rights only for those serving sentences for especially serious crimes or declared legally incompetent—membership of a banned party is not on the list. Article 37 bars convicted prisoners from parliament, but again draws no link to party affiliation. In short, the Constitution offers no foothold for lifetime political exile.
International standards ignored
The European Court of Human Rights has repeatedly stressed that democracy cannot function without political parties.
Restrictions on the right of association under Article 11 of the Convention must be prescribed by law, pursue a legitimate aim, and be necessary in a democratic society – meaning proportionate and backed by compelling evidence of an imminent threat. Dissolving a party and barring its leaders from future activity is permissible only in the gravest cases, such as advocacy of Sharia law in a secular state or direct links to terrorist violence. Peaceful opposition, however radical, does not qualify.
The Court upheld Latvia’s temporary ban on former Communist Party members in the fragile post-Soviet 1990s, but only because the measure was regularly reviewed. By contrast, it struck down Lithuania’s permanent disqualification of impeached president Rolandas Paksas, insisting that indefinite bans are incompatible with free elections.
Georgia’s amendments, with their lifelong, unreviewable penalties, fall squarely on the wrong side of this line, human rights activists say.
The wider slide
Georgia was once the post-Soviet beacon of reform. Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it has lurched toward authoritarianism. Senior opposition figures languish in prison; police arrest protesters with growing brutality; a “foreign agents” law stifles civil society. EU accession talks are frozen amid mutual recriminations. Billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, Georgian Dream’s shadowy founder, frames the opposition as warmongering puppets of the West while deepening economic ties with Moscow.
Saakashvili himself, jailed since 2021 on abuse-of-power charges and facing release no earlier than 2034, remains a lightning rod—celebrated by some for modernising the country, reviled by others for the 2008 war and alleged authoritarian excesses.
Sources: Transparency International statement, Reuters, The Guardian, edited by a.k.
Georgian rights groups condemn proposal to punish protesters, ban opposition figures from elections
Caption: Georgian opposition parties supporters clash with riot police during a rally after local elections in Tbilisi, Georgia, 04 October 2025. Elections to local governments are held in Georgia on 04 October, where members of municipal meetings and 64 mayors of cities will be elected. More than 3.5 million voters will be able to take part in the elections. EPA/DAVID MDZINARISHVILI
Updated: October 29, 2025 - 13:20
