How Can We Accuse Them?<\/strong><\/p>\nThe political landscape in the country is worse than ever. All the hope people had in December 2024 has vanished, replaced by the sad reality of an opposition too fragmented to unite and work together. Yet how can we blame the opposition leaders for being so divided, when the road to power looks more like a minefield than a staircase?<\/p>\n
In recent months, several new figures have emerged\u2014only to disappear as quickly as they appeared. Repression, blackmail, pressure, corruption \u2014 such are the obstacles facing anyone who dares to become a politician in Georgia today. The old opposition figures have simply vanished. Salome Zurabishvili, sadly, failed to unite the opposition or even create a minimal common front. That may prove to be her greatest political failure.<\/p>\n
The hand of Georgian Dream has grown ever stronger, merciless, and \u2014 sadly \u2014 clever. Economically, the country is not doing too badly at the moment. \u201cIt is Georgia of the nineties, but we have electricity, gas, communication, transport, and a minimum of purchasing power.\u201d Georgian Dream understood this perfectly: give people bread, and they will eat from your hand.<\/p>\n
The propaganda \u2014 hammering on the risks of a \u201csecond Ukraine,\u201d of war, economic collapse, and Western decadence \u2014 has become so relentless that a part of the population prefers to remain silent, simply to preserve what little stability they have. The future seems too uncertain to risk losing everything once again in a new civil conflict.<\/p>\n
Georgia Has Lost \u2014 in the Sense That Hope Is Gone.<\/strong><\/p>\nHope for a quiet, democratic change \u2014 in the spirit of Saakashvili\u2019s 2004 Rose Revolution \u2014 has faded away. The state\u2019s growing repression, the labeling of peaceful protesters as terrorists, and the alleged (or staged) \u201cassault\u201d on the Orbeliani Palace have sealed the coffin.<\/p>\n
That particular event, which took place on October 4th \u2014 the day of municipal elections across Georgia \u2014 remains highly contested. In reality, it gave the authorities exactly the pretext they needed to portray peaceful demonstrators as violent radicals terrorists seeking an armed uprising. To this narrative was added the supposed discovery of a hidden weapons cache, \u201cready\u201d for use on October 4th but conveniently found the day after, unused.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The attack on the Orbeliani Palace completely undermined months of peaceful struggle. In its wake \u2014 under rising government pressure \u2014 people withdrew from the streets, out of fear or sheer disappointment.<\/p>\n
Georgia has lost, because under this constant pressure, civil society is being silenced; the opposition is disappearing, jailed, or pushed into exile; and ordinary people are losing faith in any peaceful outcome. No rational or talented person wants to risk everything in an armed revolution.<\/p>\n
The recent wave of Gen Z-led uprisings around the world \u2014 in Nepal, Morocco, Madagascar \u2014 briefly reignited hope among Georgians and a fatigued opposition that tried, one last time, to shock itself back to life. But the reality remains bleak.<\/p>\n
It hurts to write these lines, but the truth is clear: we need a bigger turning point, a stronger catalyst to awaken the people. Some believe that banning opposition parties will trigger resistance; I doubt it. The recent \u201cflagship\u201d operation, portraying the opposition as terrorists bent on revolution, has only deepened fear \u2014 paving the way for even harsher repression in the name of \u201cnational peace.\u201d<\/p>\n
So what should we do?<\/strong><\/p>\nLet the country drift into the Russian orbit? No.<\/p>\n
We \u2014 the Georgian diaspora and friends of democratic Georgia \u2014 must double our support for civil society and raise awareness abroad about the situation.<\/p>\n
But paradoxically, Europe must also take tougher measures against those in power \u2014 and their families. Even though Bidzina Ivanishvili\u2019s fortune can absorb most sanctions, Europe must go further: suspend visa-free travel, cut direct subsidies to the government, sanction the regime and its economic networks.<\/p>\n
We do not want Georgia to turn toward Russian or Chinese markets, but we must make it difficult for those in power to continue governing comfortably. Only when daily life worsens for ordinary people, while the ruling elite remain rich and untouched, will the population see the true face of this regime. These are the citizens who have chosen to stay silent, clinging to the illusion of stability \u2014 the ones who must open their eyes and realize that the very power they trust is the one quietly dismantling their future.<\/p>\n
At the same time, Europe must heavily finance civil society, support activists with opportunities in Europe, and help them build networks and the foundations of a future democratic Georgia. The EU must also counter the propaganda that blames it for Georgia\u2019s economic downturn \u2014 showing instead that the decline stems from Georgian Dream\u2019s autocratization.<\/p>\n
In short, Europe\u2019s support for grassroots organizations, especially in rural areas, must demonstrate that wherever Georgian Dream does not act \u2014 or chooses not to look \u2014 a democratic and European Georgia is already being built.<\/p>\n
Louis Sandro Zarandia<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/p>[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Un titre volontairement pol\u00e9mique pour un article d\u2019opinion, refl\u00e9tant la lassitude et la perte d\u2019espoir en un changement pacifique. C\u2019est une affirmation difficile \u00e0 formuler, mais c\u2019est pourtant ce que l\u2019on ressent en observant la politique int\u00e9rieure du pays depuis un an. Il y a un an, j\u2019\u00e9crivais que la G\u00e9orgie risquait de devenir une […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"1080","footnotes":""},"categories":[30,10,31,12],"tags":[38,35,13,36],"class_list":["post-29335","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-anglophone","category-eurasie","category-georgie","category-union-europeenne","tag-opinion-article","tag-russie","tag-ukraine","tag-urss"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29335","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29335"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29335\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29351,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29335\/revisions\/29351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.globalscholarperspective.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}