Georgia's ruling party launches impeachment proceedings against president

The ruling “Georgian Dream - Democratic Georgia” party is launching impeachment proceedings against President Salome Zurabishvili, party head Irakli Kobakhidze said.

On August 31, Zurabishvili went to hold meetings with European leaders in support of granting Georgia the status of a candidate country for membership in the European Union, despite the government's refusal to do so. The ruling party said earlier that this was a violation of the constitution and one of the two grounds for impeachment of the Georgian president, Sputnik-Georgia reports. 

“Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili has grossly violated the Constitution of Georgia and started a series of visits to foreign countries without the consent of the government. According to the Constitution, only the government of Georgia is authorised to implement both domestic and foreign policy of the country," Kobakhidze stated at the briefing.

The party head explained that according to subparagraph "A" of paragraph 1 of Article 52 of the Constitution of Georgia, the president exercises representative powers in foreign relations only with the consent of the government.

“Consequently, the text of the Constitution does not leave even minimal space for its ambiguous interpretation," Kobakhidze emphasised.

The party leader also stated that the president's attitude to the processes related to Georgia's obtaining the status of a candidate for EU accession is radically different from the Georgian government.

"The Georgian Constitution provides for the only effective legal mechanism to respond to its violation - impeachment. Yesterday and the day before yesterday [ August 30-31] we repeatedly noted that despite the gross violation of the constitution, in the current political situation, it is impossible to bring the impeachment procedure to an end.

Impeachment requires the support of 100 parliamentarians, and therefore, without the votes of the radical opposition, it has no prospect of execution. However, despite this, at the meeting of the political council of the party we decided to initiate the impeachment procedure against the President of Georgia," Kobakhidze said at the briefing.

Impeachment of the president requires the consent of 2/3 of the full parliament. The parliamentary majority has only 84 seats, while 100 seats are needed for impeachment.

The Georgian president plans to visit Switzerland, Poland, Belgium, Bulgaria, Denmark in the fall of 2023 and the Czech Republic, UAE and Israel in December. All visits have been denied to her by the government.

On August 31, Zurabishvili met with her German counterpart Frank-Walter Steinmeier.