Vote Count Underway

The Central Election Commission started after midnight posting on its website results coming from polling stations.

Results from 171 polling stations – out of total 3,558 – were posted by 4am local time on Thursday and the number keeps increasing gradually.

The ruling party leads with huge margin in those polling stations, followed by the nine-party bloc.

According to exit poll results, which the opposition said it would not trust, the ruling party has won a landslide victory with slightly over 63%, followed by the nine-party bloc with over 14%.

The National Movement Party leaders, who met supporters at its campaign headquarters, were jubilant after exit poll results. They, however, said would wait for early official results expected for early Thursday. Davit Bakradze, the number one in the ruling party’s list of MP candidates, said that he did not expect official results would differ largely from those of exit poll.

The ruling party is also expected to gain most of the majoritarian MP seats.

If confirmed it would mean that the ruling part would have a good chance to retain two-third of seats in the new 150-member parliament.

The opposition, meanwhile, has alleged ballot fraud and said it would further deepen the political crisis.

The nine-party opposition bloc said it would continue “electoral struggle” through filing complaints before calling for the street protest rallies. The Republican Party said it would also follow that path.

The Labor Party leader, Shalva Natelashvili, said he would not recognize election results. He said in an interview with Rustavi 2 TV overnight on May 22 that his party would not even enter into the new parliament and when attacking President Saakashvili he said “persons like him are called bastards.”

Voter turnout, according to the Central Election Commission, was 55% meaning that 1,905,960 voters have cast their ballots out of total 3,465,736.

The entire polling day was dominated with mutual accusations between the ruling and opposition parties.

Various opposition parties, mainly the nine-party opposition bloc, were holding press briefings almost in every hour throughout the polling day.

Opposition’s accusations mainly involved intimidation and pressure of opposition representatives at the polling stations, cases of ‘merry-go-round’ mainly in the provincial regions – although the alleged cases of multiple voting were also reported in Tbilisi as well. Several cases of scuffles at the polling station were also reported. 

The ruling party was responding by stating that elections were ongoing “in normal condition” and the opposition’s “groundless allegations” aimed at “artificial straining of the situation” to create an illusion of chaos.