Judicial Capture in Action? Georgia’s Appeals Court Blocks Election Challenge

Following the controversial outcome of the October 26 election in Georgia which somehow returned the Georgia Dream party to power, despite overwhelming rejection by the public and mass protests, the Appeals Court now appears to be under extraordinary pressure to bury challenges and confirm the result.

According to a report by Civil.ge, the Tbilisi Court of Appeals held an extraordinary 24-hour-long hearing in order to appeals by the watchdog Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association (GYLA) and the local observer mission My Vote over the alleged violations of ballot secrecy.

The hearing was chaired by Judge Davit Akhalbedashvili, with Judges Gocha Didava and Dimitri Gvritishvili as members of the collegium. On November 6, as the court session started the plaintiffs filed a motion to recuse Judge Dimitri Gvritishvili, considered to be one of the most influential judges in the Georgian judiciary, due, as plaintiffs argued, to his negative stance towards the civil society organizations, but the collegium did not grant the motion.

The refusal to recuse the judge also occurred during the hearing at the Kutaisi Court of Appeals, where one of the members of the collegium was Shota Siradze, the father of Vazha Siradze, the Director of the Georgian Patrol Police Department of Interior Ministry and one of the high-ranking officials whose sanction was demanded by the Members of the European Parliament. TI-Georgia sought to have the judge recused, but the court did not grant the request.

Formula News also ran an article under the title, “GD-influenced court scrambles to overturn voter secrecy breach ruling.“

A panel of judges, including Judge Dimitri Gvritishvili—whom Georgian civil society and opposition figures label a member of the “court clan”—is presiding over the case. Gvritishvili declined to separate the cases, asserting that the Court of Appeals is the ultimate authority on election irregularities. “He essentially admitted that if these cases were considered by different judges, there was a possibility of different decisions,” said GYLA chairwoman Nona Kurdovanidze, adding that the volume of cases consolidated into one trial jeopardizes the right to a fair hearing.

The Central Election Commission of Georgia (CEC) has called for the annulment of a decision by Tetritskharo Judge Vladimer Khuchua, who upheld GYLA’s claim that voter secrecy had been compromised, citing visible markings on the back of ballots. Judge Khuchua’s investigation included an examination of randomly selected precinct ballots from Tsalka and Tetritskharo districts, along with a voting machine experiment.

Democracy Research reports:

On election day, “My Vote” monitors observed 1131 polling precincts continuously and hundreds of polling precincts through mobile groups. Out of those 1131 precincts: the observer was hindered from observing – at 160 polling precincts; Inking was not checked – at 191 polling precincts; Inking was not applied – at 153 polling precincts; Secrecy of voting was violated – in 365 precincts; Physical confrontation/violence/pressure was recorded – in 85 precincts; Unauthorized persons were present at the precinct or near the precinct – 259 polling precincts. In addition, we have identified 196 precincts (i.e. 17% of the precincts under our observation), where the violations took place in a repeated, continuous, and in some cases systemic manner.

The above irregularities were contested in the District Election Commissions and later in courts. As shown above, all electoral disputes were completed by the rejection of our claims.