Tamar Zhvania, the CEC Chairperson presented preliminary results to the public on mayoral elections of self-governing cities/self-governing communities of October 21 as of 11:00 am.

As the chairperson stated during the news briefing, on October 21, voters cast their votes to elect 2058 members of 64 Sakrebulos and 64 Mayors. Voter turnout was 45,65% (1 570 563 voters). With reference to gender statistics, based on preliminary data, 789 652 women (50,28%) and 780 911 men (49,72%) participated in the polling.

“Vote counting process at election precincts was conducted in accordance with law. Representatives of electoral subjects and observers had an opportunity to freely observe vote counting process.

Once again, we would like to underline, that generally, elections were held in a peaceful environment and no specific incidents were observed, except certain procedural violations upon which the Election Administration will have the relevant response. It is worth underlining that the voters had the opportunity to express their free will.

Once the PEC summary protocols are drawn up, relevant district election commissions provide protocols to the CEC and upon receipt they are being uploaded on the special website www.results.cec.gov.ge.

As for the complaints, in total 309 complaints are submitted to the DECs (the majority of complaints were submitted to Marneuli, Vake, Nadzaladevi and Kutaisi). The complaints were filed by the representatives of local observer organizations and election subjects. Complaints basically refer to the procedural shortcomings and parts of them were resolved in place. Majority of the complaints submitted to the DECs refer to imposing disciplinary liability measures to the commission members, though there is a certain number of complaints regarding procedural violations and needs further examination and relevant response.

On E-day, the CEC was receiving information on various facts and majority of them were verified by the CEC. Some of the facts, announced by the political parties’ representatives were not confirmed in certain cases; however, some cases identified by the representatives of the non-governmental organizations appeared to be proved. Timely communication and information derived from their side took place and obviously, in some possible cases the CEC reacted promptly. Further reactions will be followed by the CEC on the cases worth of attention in the future.

I would like to express my gratitude to each voter for demonstrating civic responsibility to actively participate in the elections and for expressing their constitutional right. I am also thankful to the election administration for their determined work for whole Election Day and night, as well as electoral stakeholders, international and local observer organizations for monitoring election process and accordingly, supported the conduct of election process in a transparent and on a high professional way. I would also like to express my gratitude towards the media for covering election process and for the cooperation with election administration” – stated Tamar Zhvania.

The CEC Chairperson also informed media on election districts, where presumably, second round elections will take place based on preliminary results. The mentioned DEC’s are the following:

#29 Kazbegi election district, #35 Khashuri election district, #36 Borjomi election district, #60 Ozurgeti election district, #59 Kutaisi election district and #65 Martvili election district.