Interview | Pia Kauma: “We Want to Remain Neutral, Not Take Sides”

“Had I traveled to Tbilisi and met only with government officials, it would have sent precisely the message I wanted to avoid: that we were showing support for the government. As I’ve said, that is not our role, and we do not wish to do so,” says Pia Kauma, President of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and a member of the Finnish Parliament. Her planned—and ultimately canceled—visit sparked widespread debate in Georgia. Many, including the Georgian opposition, President Salome Zurabishvili, and an ever-increasing number of Western diplomats and politicians, argued that such a visit would legitimize both the government and the elections, both of which remain under question.

This interview is a partner post from Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Georgian Service who conducted this exclusive interview. Its translated version was originally published in Georgian. Vazha Tavberidze of RFE/RL conducted the interview.

Vazha Tavberidze opened the conversation with Pia Kauma by asking about the original objectives of the now indefinitely postponed visit.

Let’s begin with your planned – and subsequently cancelled – visit to Georgia, as it caused quite a stir here. What were your plans?

ODIHR published its final report regarding the findings and recommendations on Georgia’s October 26 parliamentary elections at the end of December. And my intention, and the intention of my colleagues, was to travel to Georgia and to engage in dialogue the government representatives, the opposition and also civil society, regarding these recommendations. There are tvelve very good primary recommendations that should be implemented immediately, and we were really ready to help Georgia as a whole in order to get the work started.

You said you would be having a dialogue with “the government and the opposition.” Today, in Georgia, the government is not considered as legitimate by a large number of people. The argument was that your coming here and talking to the government would lend them legitimacy. Do you agree?

I do understand that some people may interpret it that way, but it was never our intention by any means, to show it as an equivalent of us recognizing the government by traveling to Georgia. We don’t do that as a general rule. It is not our job. Not our mandate.

So why did you change your mind, if I may ask?

It would have been very important to engage with all the important counterparts in Georgian society, including the opposition and civil society organizations. But it seemed that there was not enough willingness to meet us at this point, and I think that while it is important that we, on the OSCE side, show initiative to travel to Georgia, there has to be enough, how to put it, welcoming spirit in the country too.

And this welcoming spirit was lacking on which part? Or why was the welcoming spirit in short supply?

I received a letter from three opposition parties saying that they would rather see me coming later or they would like to have certain conditions in place before I come. One of them was regarding setting a date for new elections, and the other was regarding the detained protesters- that those people should be released. And at this point, of course, it would be very difficult for me to meet these requirements. But I would like to add that the government officials were willing to meet with us and were also very prepared and ready to discuss all the recommendations set by ODIHR.

If I understand correctly, the visit was canceled not because you agreed with the opposition’s suggestions or shared their concerns, but because they weren’t willing to meet you, until those concerns remained unaddressed, right? And you didn’t want to meet only with the government.

Yes, because had I traveled to Tbilisi and met only with government officials, it would have sent precisely the message I wanted to avoid: that we were showing support for the government. As I’ve said, that is not our role, and we do not wish to do so. So in this very hectic situation, it really would be useful only if we met all the important parties.

The Central Committee representative recently said that your arrival would once again underline that the elections were carried out and the Georgian people’s will had been manifested. So it’s not just the opposition’s narrative. Both camps have seen it as some sort of legitimacy criteria.

Yes, and we want to remain neutral. We observe elections and help analyze the shortcomings, provide recommendations, and help implement them. That’s all. We don’t want to take any sides.

As the statements from the ruling party come in, the overall narrative seems to be that they believe you canceled your planned visit due to pressure. Was that so?

No, not quite. I can imagine why they think so, because if you look at the social media and some other channels of media, you can see that there were people expressing very openly that they would be opposing my visit to Georgia. But I don’t think that was the decisive factor in my decision not to come to Georgia this time. It was rather that I thought that people were not ready for that kind of dialogue. We will have to wait a little bit.

And yet, if you plan to visit in a few months’ time, provided the situation does not change, I think the very same rhetoric will still be aimed at you. People will essentially say, ‘Don’t come until you can’t say that this government is illegitimate.’ So I think a very fair question to ask is, in your eyes, does this government qualify as a legitimate government?

I cannot say that. I think it’s up to your constitutional court and other judicial and political systems to decide. I cannot take any decision on that.

If the OSCE/ODIHR report that has been published about Georgia were to be published about the elections in Finland, would you have had questions about the legitimacy of the government?

I have thought about that. I think, first of all, all countries have things to improve. The level of democracy is never finalized. There are always things to improve. But had that case been Finland, I think it would have been very important also from our point of view that nobody from outside tells us if the government is legitimate or not. It would really harm the sovereignty of the country if somebody from outside stipulated its legitimacy.

So, imagine this report has come out about Finland. What would your concerns be then?

Well, I would have promoted dialogue in that case too. I think it’s always a good tool. And what I’m really concerned about when it comes to Georgia at the moment is that the governing party and the opposition are quite apart from each other in their views. In my opinion, at some point, it would be advisable to have somebody mediate or facilitate a dialogue between the different parties, as is done in Finland. People, especially in small countries, simply have to stick together. If we are divided, we cannot fight the external fights. And therefore, we should do our best to avoid polarization and try to understand each other.

The report sparked a debate: the government sees it as validating the elections, since it says the elections were competitive and parties could freely campaign, while the opposition and protesters point to violations and intimidation, questioning their fairness. While ODIHR can’t judge legitimacy, were these elections free and fair for a democracy?

I must disappoint you in this because we also generally don’t use the word “free and fair elections.” We rather focus on there being competition in the election, and if that competition allowed all the political parties to campaign freely.

Focusing solely on competitiveness and campaigning freely isn’t enough to capture the full picture, is it? ODIHR has labeled elections in countries like Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Belarus, and Kazakhstan as non-competitive. Is that the bar for judging elections? Just because Georgia’s elections aren’t as bad, does that make them acceptable?

Well, I would say that in many countries, the starting point as far as elections and democracy are concerned is quite low. So, we look at the big picture and also the consecutive elections. What are the developments and improvements that are made between different elections? That is very important. But we don’t really compare countries to one another because that would not be fair. Every country is different, and every election system is also a little bit different. There are no exactly 100% alike systems in any country.