By Felix Light
TBILISI (Reuters) – Georgia’s ruling party on Wednesday nominated Mikheil Kavelashvili, a former parliamentary deputy and professional soccer player, as its candidate for president in an election due to be held on Dec. 14.
Kavelashvili, who played briefly for Manchester City as a striker in the mid-1990s, is a founder member of People’s Power, a splinter group of the ruling Georgian Dream party, and has a record of hardline, anti-Western statements.
In September, he described the opposition as a “fifth column” who were trying to undermine peace in Georgia at the instruction of “the American administration and specific senators”.
In June, he accused U.S. congressmen of planning for “a direct violent revolution, a plan for the Ukrainization of Georgia, and an insatiable desire to destroy our country.”
His election is all but assured, as Georgian Dream dominates the electoral college of members of parliament and local government representatives.
Although the president’s post is largely ceremonial, the choice of Kavelashvili is likely to be viewed by the European Union and the United States as a further sign that Georgia is turning away from the West and moving closer to Russia.
He is set to succeed President Salome Zourabichvili, who was elected as an ally of the governing bloc, but has become a trenchant critic, accusing it of deliberately derailing Georgia’s EU accession hopes.
Zourabichvili has denounced last month’s parliamentary election, won by Georgian Dream, as fraudulent, and opposition lawmakers have refused to take their seats in parliament.
UNITY PLEDGE
In a speech accepting the nomination, Kavelashvili, 53, pledged to unite Georgia, while accusing the outgoing president of having “insulted and ignored” the country’s constitution.
Though Georgia is traditionally among the most pro-Western countries to have emerged from the former Soviet Union, Georgian Dream has in recent years deepened ties with Russia, whilst also being accused by its opponents of authoritarian tendencies.
The governing party says it wants Georgia to join the EU, but Brussels says Tbilisi’s application is frozen over newly passed laws on “foreign agents” and curbing LGBT rights that Western critics say are draconian and Russian-inspired.
People’s Power, which Kavelashvili co-founded, is seen as among the most openly pro-Russian players in mainstream Georgian politics, and has championed the foreign agent and anti-LGBT laws.
Kavelashvili’s nomination was announced on Wednesday by Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire former prime minister who founded Georgian Dream and is widely seen as the country’s most powerful figure.
Ivanishvili praised the ex-soccer player as an “outstanding” politician and athlete, contrasting him with Zourabichvili, who he accused of “gross betrayal” of the country.
(Reporting by Felix Light; Editing by Mark Trevelyan)
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