Founded 2012 | Seats in Parliament 6 / 150 | |
Leader Davit Tarkhan-MouraviIrma Inashvili Ideology Pro-RussianEuroscepticismPopulismChristian democracy | ||
The Alliance of Patriots of Georgia (Georgian: საქართველოს პატრიოტთა ალიანსი, Sakartvelos Patriotta Aliansi, APG) is a self-defined populist opposition party in the nation of Georgia. It was founded in 2012 by leaders from the Resistance Movement and its platform includes anti-Western positions.
In the 2014 local elections, it gained an aggregate vote nationwide of 4.6%, exceeding the 4% threshold required to qualify as a political party for government funding. Through party-list voting in 47 cities, it won proportional seat representation on the local councils of 30 municipalities, including Tbilisi.
In June 2016, the party formed a bloc with five other parties (Free Georgia, led by Kakha Kukava; Tavisupleba, led by Konstantine Gamsakhurdia; Traditionalists, led by Akaki Asatiani; New Christian-Democrats, led by Gocha Jojua, and Political Movement of Law Enforcement and Armed Forces Veterans) for the scheduled 2016 parliamentary election, finishing 3rd place in the proportional votе and just passing the electoral threshold of 5%.
History
The party was established in December 2012, by founders including Soso Manjavidze, Davit Tarkhan-Mouravi and Irma Inashvili. Giorgi Lomia is political secretary. The party leadership also includes former warlord Emzar Kvitsiani, a figure that has attracted significant controversy. The Alliance party was based on the Resistance Movement, a group fiercely critical of the former ruling party, the United National Movement.
It has expressed anti-Turkish sentiment, fearing Turkish expansionism. Its leaders called for a delay in signing the free trade treaty with the EU. It believes that talks about Georgia participation in NATO have gone on too long and people are discouraged in Georgia about not being accepted. Periodic polling by the U.S.-funded International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute (NDI) have "consistently showed public support for Euro-Atlantic integration at between 60 and 70 percent." Journalist Michael Cecire wrote in 2015 that "Georgia has met or exceeded almost every benchmark for NATO membership, but continues to be stonewalled in Europe over fears of Russia’s reaction."
The Alliance party has a television channel, Obieqtivi, run by Inashvili. Davit Tarkhan-Mouravi has a series on the channel in which he lectures on the Bible and Orthodox Christianity. A mathematician, he served in earlier administrations as "head of the state department for information technologies in the early 2000s, and as head of the customs department for several months in 2003."
In the 2014 local elections, the Georgian Dream coalition, including the Republican Party, gained 50.80%; they have been leading the government since 2012. The UNM gained a nationwide party-list vote in 2014 of 22.41%. Nino Burjanadze and her United Opposition coalition gained the third best results in the local elections, with nationwide 10.22% in the party-list vote. Burjanadze revived a Eurasianist rhetoric, which is supported by Russia, and the campaign was "fueled by massive influxes of what was likely Russian money."
The Alliance of Patriots of Georgia party received 4.7% of the aggregate vote, meeting the required threshold of 4% to qualify as a political party, and making it eligible for future state funding for elections. It ran in a party-list contest for proportional Sakrebulo seats in 47 of a total of 71 municipalities and cities. In 30 jurisdictions, its party-list voting exceeded 4%, making it eligible for seats on 30 local councils, including that of Tbilisi.
Inashvili finished fourth in the mayoral election in Tblisi with 5.4% of the vote; the party won two seats in the Tbilisi City Assembly. In addition, Alliance of Patriots of Georgia mayoral candidates qualified for run-off elections against Georgian Dream (GD) candidates in the cities of Poti and Ozurgeti; and Alliance candidates qualified for second-round runoffs for municipal executives in the municipalities of Lanchkhuti and Khulo.