Tazo Datunashvili, Executive Secretary of the “Strong Georgia – Lelo” party, reacted to Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili’s statement that citizens, “Strong Georgia,” and “ALDE” “officially became protector organizations of a terrorist” because they refused to expel Aleko Elisashvili from their ranks. Datunashvili said that Papuashvili’s statement serves a political purpose: discrediting the “Strong Georgia – Lelo” party.

“Shalva Papuashvili hasn’t even broken a brick over anyone. He is such a miserable person that I don’t even want to comment on him. He’s extremely low-quality, a trickster. He knows very well that he is violating the presumption of innocence. Being the Speaker of the Georgian Parliament, without a court ruling on the matter, he already accuses someone of a specific crime, calling [Aleko Elisashvili] a terrorist. Papuashvili is crafty, and this should not be overlooked. He is doing this deliberately. His political goal is to discredit our party, and, very likely, this will be used in legal proceedings. Some naive people have let slip that it will be used against Lelo in the case of banning parties. Papuashvili knows very well that legally there is no connection between Aleko Elisashvili and ‘Lelo – Strong Georgia.’ Our position is officially recorded, and Elisashvili himself has responded to someone like Papuashvili, yet he does not stop,” Datunashvili stated.

Datunashvili also spoke about the planned amendments to the “Law on Assemblies and Demonstrations.” He criticized the restrictions on protests, noting that even standing on the sidewalk in small numbers is now limited.

“It’s a tragic, catastrophic reality. People are prohibited from protesting on the sidewalk. Restrictions have gone so far that even a small gathering on the sidewalk is restricted. There is an old Tbilisi saying: ‘Even three men are a gang,’ and now that too becomes punishable. Expressing one’s opinion on the sidewalk is administratively penalized. This is the ultimate mutilation of a fundamental right.

“If we listen to some speakers from ‘Georgian Dream,’ we hear hysterical, propagandistic rhetoric: ‘It’s just a few people,’ ‘20 people standing, 12, 30.’ The reality is that there are dozens gathered in Parliament, calling themselves the Parliament of Georgia’s 11th convocation. To suppress a specific protest, they have changed an entire set of laws. This is not a minor interference; it’s surgical intervention. A 500-lari fine became 5,000 lari. They imposed imprisonment for participating in protests. When they didn’t like the form of a march, they showed hysterical, panicked fear - no other explanation.

“I don’t know what goes on in their diseased minds, but when you say one thing and do another, that is a simple definition of schizophrenia. They say, ‘No one cares about 50 people,’ ‘Do what you want,’ ‘Stand there and protest,’ and at the same time, they pass laws that prevent people from standing on the sidewalk and expressing their protest,” Datunashvili said.