Page 13 - GEORptApr21

2.6 Polls & Sociology
Four in 10 of Georgia’s voters see no party “close to their views”
Georgia’s corrupted anti-corruption strategy
Some 40% of a sample of Georgia’s population told a pollster “no party is close to their views” and less than half expressed a political preference. The poll was conducted for the National Democratic Institute (NDI) by CRRC Georgia using UK government funding.
Notably, 14% of respondents refused to answer and 8% were undecided, meaning the share of those openly expressing a political preference only amounted to 38%.
As regards those who expressed a political preference, a majority (23% of the polled sample, or 60.5% of those providing a valid answer) opted for the ruling party, Georgian Dream. That almost equates to the two-thirds majority the party holds in parliament following last autumn's general election.
A total of 14% of respondents (or 39.5% of those providing a valid answer) opted for another party. Main opposition grouping, United National Movement (UNM), attracted 7% of respondents.
The survey was conducted on February 17-24, based on a representative sample of 2,024 telephone interviews across Georgia (excluding the occupied territories). The average margin of error of the survey is +/- 1.4pp. Respondents were randomly selected.
Transparency International this week pointed to Georgia as an example of how not to do things once you have earnt initial plaudits as a country moving ahead with anti-corruption efforts. “Georgia’s anti-corruption reforms stall amid political crisis and allegations of state capture,” was the headline on a blog post the Berlin-based NGO put out with its Corruption Perceptions Index 2020 (CPI 2020) released on January 28.
Georgia’s score of 56 points in the index is unchanged from 2019, when it dropped by two points compared with 2018. In fact, its score has actually stagnated since 2016, after rallying for two years from 2014.
“In a country once celebrated as a reformer, anti-corruption efforts have visibly stagnated over nearly a past decade,” TI Georgia stated in the blog post.
This statement needs some explanation since it might be seen to conflict with the data. Tracking the CPI scores reveals a sharp improvement over the initial years of the decade and stagnation thereafter—but, as it precisely reflects “perceptions” rather than fixed reality, the noted improvement might rather have reflected expectations ahead of the new regime that took office in 2012, when billionaire businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili was appointed as prime minister after the victory of the six-party Georgian Dream coalition.
13 GEORGIA Country Report April 2021 www.intellinews.com