Strong Georgia files lawsuit with Constitutional Court to restore voting rights for immigrants
The Strong Georgia-Lelo coalition has filed a lawsuit with the Constitutional Court challenging the restriction of voting rights for Georgian citizens living abroad.
As one of the leaders of Strong Georgia-Lelo, Giorgi Sioridze, stated, the coalition is launching a legal battle to restore voting rights for immigrants.
According to him, the 2024 parliamentary elections showed that at polling stations opened abroad, where, according to Sioridze, the Georgian Dream did not have the opportunity to manipulate elections, use administrative resources, and pressure voters, the ruling party received only 13 percent.
“In response, the Georgian Dream has practically deprived hundreds of thousands of our compatriots of the right to vote abroad. Polling stations abroad will no longer be opened. Their response to immigrants was particularly cynical: “We are not taking away the right to vote, everyone can come.” Everyone will remember how unrealistic this is,” Sioridze said.
According to him, the coalition has been fighting for years to open more polling stations abroad and for immigrants to be involved in the political process.
According to Sioridze, the coalition has been working on the constitutional lawsuit for months and believes that the issue is not just a change in regulation, but an “anti-constitutional act.”
“This lawsuit will be published and each immigrant will have the opportunity to formally become a participant in this lawsuit, to become a party, to argue in the Constitutional Court, and qualified lawyers will provide them with legal representation in court,” he said.
According to Sioridze, the coalition does not have high expectations for the Constitutional Court’s decision, however, according to his own assessment, the political party’s struggle “implies a struggle on all fronts.”
“We are fighting the regime. The regime is trying to restrict citizens and deprive them of the right to participate in elections, and we are also using the method of institutional struggle,” Giorgi Sioridze said.