As part of the agreement, the signatories pledged to bring forward a strategy to campaign together, to avoid losing votes to each other in the October election, and to support the re-election of the current president, the anti-Georgian Dream Salome Zourabichvili. The statement also calls Western countries to help ensure free and fair elections.
United National Movement leader Tina Bokuchava said the parties struck the deal “to defeat the pro-Russian government … [and] to save Georgian democracy.”
Georgia was granted EU candidate status in December despite warnings of backsliding on human rights. Just months later, Georgian Dream introduced controversial new legislation that would brand Western NGOs as “foreign agents” and cracked down on LGBTQ+ rights.
Georgian Dream has accused a shadowy cabal of Western organizations and politicians of trying to drag the country into its orbit, despite consistently widespread support for EU membership among the public.
Critics of the government say the rules mirror policies introduced by neighboring Russia. Tens of thousands of Georgians have taken to the streets to protest after Brussels warned the laws would torpedo the country’s EU candidacy.
Nonetheless, polling shows that the government retains plenty of support in the country, with around a third of voters saying they would vote the party back in. This is less than the 48 percent who backed Georgian Dream at the last election in 2020, but would still make it the largest party.