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Misuse of Administrative Resources During Georgia's 2020

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Misuse of Administrative Resources During Georgia's 2020 Misuse of Administrative Resources during Georgia’s 2020 Parliamentary Elections Final Report December 2020 Authors Gigi Chikhladze Tamta Kakhidze Co-author and research supervisor Levan Natroshvili This report was made possible by the support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The opinions expressed in the report belong to Transparency International Georgia and may not reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government. Contents Key Findings ____________________________________________________________________ 4 Introduction ____________________________________________________________________ 7 Chapter I. What is the misuse of administrative resources during electoral processes? ____________________________________________________________________ 8 Chapter II. Misuse of Enforcement Administrative Resources during Electoral Processes ____________________________________________________________________ 9 1. Violence, threatening, intimidation, and law enforcement response _________ 10 1.1. Incidents that occurred during the pre-election period _____________________ 10 1.2. Incidents that occurred during the Election Day ____________________________ 14 1.3. Incidents that occurred after the Election Day ____________________________ 15 2. Destruction of political party property and campaigning materials and law enforcement response to them _________________________________________________ 15 3. Use of water cannons against demonstrators gathered at the CEC ___________ 16 4. Dismissal of employees allegedly on political grounds _______________________ 17 5. Review of Election Day and Post-Election Complaints ________________________ 18 5.1. Violations revealed on Election Day _______________________________________ 18 5.2. Complaints concerning imbalances in summary protocols __________________ 19 5.2.1. Review of complaints in DECs ___________________________________________ 19 5.2.2. Review of appeals in district / city courts _________________________________ 20 5.2.3. Review of appeals in district / city courts _________________________________ 21 5.2.4. Consideration of the complaint and lawsuits filed on the fact of falsification in one of the polling stations in Marneuli __________________________________________ 21 6. The process of selecting professionally appointed members of DECs and PECs ___ 24 7. The Case of Cartographers __________________________________________________ 24 8. Dissemination of secret records of leaders of opposition political parties _____ 26 9. The case of the tents of Giorgi Vashadze – the Builder Strategy _____________ 27 Chapter III. Misuse of Legislative Administrative Resources during Electoral Processes ____________________________________________________________________ 29 1. Vicious rules and procedures for staffing election commissions _______________ 29 2. Resolution N45 / 20 of the CEC ______________________________________________ 30 Chapter IV. Misuse of Institutional Administrative Resources during Electoral Processes ____________________________________________________________________ 32 1. Mobilization of employees of budgetary organizations and their involvement in pre-election campaign _________________________________________________________ 32 2. Alleged illegal campaigning _________________________________________________ 32 2.1. Campaigning through personal accounts on social network _________________ 33 2.2. Other cases ______________________________________________________________ 33 3. Campaigning by using state-funded projects _________________________________ 34 Chapter V. Misuse of Financial Administrative Resources during Electoral Processes ____________________________________________________________________ 35 Recommendations ___________________________________________________________ 39 Abbreviations ________________________________________________________________ 40 Key Findings Transparency International Georgia’s (TI Georgia) observation of the parliamentary elections from July 1, November 22, 2020 showed that the misuse of administrative resources during electoral processes is still problematic for Georgia. Ineffective investigation of violence, the politicization of public institutions, including election commissions, and mobilization of the employees of budgetary organizations by the ruling party for election campaigns, the use of investigative agencies to discredit political opponents, and other vicious tendencies remain unchanged from election to election: Misuse of enforcement administrative resources during electoral processes Several important trends in the misuse of enforcement administrative resources have been identified. • Violence: From the second half of September, the number of violent incidents has increased, with several cases of group violence against supporters of political parties. The municipalities of Marneuli, Bolnisi, and Dmanisi were especially noteworthy in this regard. The Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) has launched an investigation into all incidents of violence and has quickly arrested several individuals in isolated cases. According to the information provided by the MIA, as of October 20, an investigation had been launched into 59 cases that may be related to the elections in one way or another. The investigation of 6 cases has been terminated, while the investigation of the remaining 53 cases is still ongoing. In 9 of these 53 cases, certain individuals have been prosecuted. The MIA has not released the updated statistics since October 20. Due to the low number of cases investigated, the MIA has become the subject of frequent criticism. • Property damage: Since the second half of September, cases of damaging political party offices, vehicles, campaign materials and other types of property have also increased. In terms of investigating such facts, the MIA was even less effective than in investigating cases of violence. • Use of water cannons against demonstrators gathered at the Central Election Commission (CEC): It was problematic that law enforcement officers initially used water cannons against demonstrators gathered at a protest rally in front of the CEC building on November 8 without proper grounds and warning, injuring several people. During the protest rally, professional activities of media representatives were also hindered, some of them were injured and their technical equipment was damaged. • Review of Election Day and Post-Election Complaints: Various developments, identified violations, and the litigation process during the Election Day and post-election period are also worth mentioning. From the second day of the elections, the opposition political parties started speaking about the alleged falsification of the election results. Such allegations were mainly driven by the existence of numerous instances of imbalance in the results summary protocols compiled by Precinct Election Commissions (PECs). Doubts were further increased by unsubstantiated and often inadequate decisions on complaints and appeals by the superior election commissions (district and central election commissions) and the courts. In the end, the vast majority of complaints and lawsuits filed by various entities remained either rejected or unshared. As a result, all opposition parties, whose candidates should have run in the second round, refused to recognize the election results and enter parliament. 4 • Dismissals: During the reporting period, some information has been spread about the dismissal of employees of budgetary organizations allegedly on political grounds. • Problems with the composition of election commissions: As in previous elections, this year the process of selecting professionally appointed members of district and precinct election commissions (DECs and PECs) also was a significant problem. Especially noteworthy is the #67 Zugdidi DEC, which appointed 102 out of 642 members of its subordinate PECs unlawfully, namely appointing those commissioners who were nominated by parties during the previous presidential election, which is illegal under a new regulation enacted this year. In addition, opposition political parties have reported that newly appointed members of certain district and precinct commissions were often associated in some way with the current government, work in budgetary organizations, or have close ties to members of the ruling party. TI Georgia periodically checked such information and most of it was confirmed. • Using Investigative agencies to discredit political opponents: As in previous elections, the Georgian prosecutor’s office has attempted to discredit the former ruling United National Movement party (UNM) by using a specific investigation. In particular, on October 7, the Office of Prosecutor General of Georgia arrested former members of the Government Commission on Delimitation and Demarcation, who were charged with violating Georgia’s territorial integrity. The timing of the investigation, the pre-election context, the signs of a selective approach to the investigation and the populist statements made by the ruling party leaders violating the presumption of innocence raise suspicions that the investigation serves electoral purposes and is aimed at creating misconceptions about political opponents for Georgian citizens. As in previous elections, secret audio recordings involving leaders of opposition political parties were released. The purpose of disseminating the records seems to have been to discredit these individuals. This time, too,
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