A former Manchester City football player is set to be Georgia’s next president after the ruling party selected him as its candidate.
Mikheil Kavelashvili, 53, who also played for Georgia‘s national team, is almost certain to be elected to the largely ceremonial position.
The new president will be chosen by the 300-seat electoral college, which is largely controlled by the ruling Georgian Dream party.
Their success in last month’s parliamentary election has been disputed by European election observers, who have described instances of bribery, double voting and physical violence.
The victory sparked protests and led to the opposition boycotting parliament.
Critics have accused Georgian Dream of becoming increasingly authoritarian and tilted towards Moscow.
Mr Kavelashvili told reporters “radicalisation and polarisation” in the country have been fuelled from abroad.
He accused the outgoing president of violating the constitution and declared that he would “restore the presidency to its constitutional framework”.
Mr Kavelashvili was elected to parliament in Georgia in 2016. File pic: AP
Georgian Dream recently pushed through laws similar to those used by the Kremlin to crack down on freedom of speech and LGBTQ+ rights.
In June, the EU suspended Georgia’s membership application process indefinitely after parliament passed a law requiring organisations that receive more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as “pursuing the interest of a foreign power”.
That is similar to a Russian law used to discredit groups critical of the government.
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Protesters clash with police in Georgia
On Monday President Salome Zourabichvili, who has rejected the official election results, refused to recognise the parliament’s legitimacy. Her six-year term expires next month.
She was elected by popular vote, but Georgia has approved constitutional changes that abolished the direct election of the president.
Instead the new president will be selected by a vote from an electoral college, consisting of 300 members of parliament, municipal councils and regional legislatures.
Georgian Dream has a majority in the college, making the approval of Mr Kavelashvili’s candidacy all but certain.
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Mr Kavelashvili was a striker for Manchester City in the 1995-6 season and played for several clubs in the Swiss Super League. He was elected to parliament in 2016 on the Georgian Dream ticket.
In 2022, he co-founded the People’s Power political movement, which has become known for its strong anti-Western rhetoric. It is aligned with the Georgian Dream party in parliament.
