Categories
Journalistic Survey
Articles
Reportage
Analitic
Photo Reportage
Exclusive
Interview
Foreign Media about Georgia
Editorial
Position
Reader's opinion
Blog
Themes
Children's Rights
Women's Rights
Justice
Refugees/IDPs
Minorities
Media
Army
Health
Corruption
Elections
Education
Penitentiary
Religion
Others

The war of election banners

September 30, 2016
 
Giorgi Janelidze

The election experts, representatives of NGOs and the chairwoman of the Central Election Commission positively evaluate the pre-election campaign. The CEC chairwoman promised the 2016 Parliamentary Elections will be more organized than ever. Tamar Zhvania said the miscarriages from the previous elections were easily tackled. 

The incidents took place during the 2016 pre-election campaign. We observed war of the election banners again, which was common during previous elections too. We often encounter the posters of the single mandate candidates on the pillars in the streets, who have either moustaches or ears painted over; sometimes the posters are torn down or overpasted by other political party’s poster. 

As a rule, the posters are massively pasted during night hours both in the capital and in the regions. Incidents too most probably happen during night time. On September 25, Nene Dalakishvili, the head of the Avlabari Office of the political party Paata Burtchuladze – State for People, published the damaged posters of the block in social network and posted the status: “Today we went through the places, where we placed the posters yesterday. I can swear that we did not spare the glue and fixed posters of other political parties, which were half-fallen, but now saw our posters are torn down”. 

GYLA’s lawyer, Irma Pavliashvili, has been monitoring the election environment since June 8, 2016. “Till now, alongside with other violations there were a lot of facts of prevention of dissemination and tear/damage of election materials. GYLA appealed the relevant administrative bodies about those violations. With the approaching Election Day, similar facts happen more and more frequently. The interagency commission several times issued recommendations and called on the political parties, to avoid such kind of behavior. The Election Code protects the rights of the political parties to ensure safety of their election materials and the harasser shall be punished under the law”, - the GYLA’s lawyer told humanrights.ge. 

According to the Election Code, the propaganda material can be placed on the buildings and other constructions if there is the consent from the owners or holders. Besides that, the self-governmental bodies are obliged to define the list of the buildings, on which it is forbidden to place the posters and they have to put stands for placing the election material. The stand shall be big enough so that all political parties had enough space. It is forbidden and punishable by the law to tear, overpaste or damage the election material if it is not placed on forbidden sites. 

“The political parties are obliged to remove the election material within 15 days after the officially published results; the violators will be punished according to the Georgian law. Besides, creating obstacles in the dissemination of the pre-election statements, symbols, papers, photos and other materials will be fined with 1000 GEL. The relevant self-governmental bodies form protocols in case of violation of the administrative law”, - Ana Gurieli, the lawyer of Human Rights Center, explained. 

The article 46 of the Election Code of Georgia regulates production, registration and placement of the election materials. There are preventive mechanisms if the placement of the materials is violated or posters are damaged. 

Ana Mikeladze, the speaker of the CEC: “With the support of the CEC Education Centre the grant was issued and several trainings were conducted by NGOs for the representatives of the political parties about the pre-election campaign and about the Election Day. It is also important that the CEC conducted trainings for the election administration members and delivered detailed information about the election legislation. If the election materials were damaged or the rules of placement are violated, the representatives of the local self-governments would respond accordingly”. 

By September 26, 2016 the Tbilisi City Hall Press-Agency provided us with the list of protocols elaborated by the City Monitoring Service. The document shows that based on the article 150, part I of the Administrative Misdemeanor Code (fine- 50 GEL) 131 protocols were issued, plus 3 cases were also punishable under the article 80, part I (fine – 1000 GEL). 

The article was prepared in the frame of the project implemented by Human Rights House Tbilisi with financial support of the Embassy of the Kingdom of Netherlands in Georgia. HRHT bears sole responsibility for the content of the article. The article does not necessarily reflect the views of the donor.

News