Paata Burchuladze, a prominent Georgian bass opera singer, has denied he was planning to run as a majoritarian MP, his representative in Tbilisi said on April 1.

It was reported on March 31 that the ruling National Movement Party would nominate Burchuladze as a majoritarian MP candidate in Tbilisi’s Saburtalo single-mandate constituency.

“I’ve talked to Mr. Burchuladze and I can say that this news caught even him by surprise,” Teona Jorbenadze of Burchuladze’s charity foundation, Iavnana, told Rustavi 2 TV on April 1.