The authorities are firm in their decision to hold presidential and parliamentary elections simultaneously sometime between October 1 and December 31, 2008 citing mainly foreign factors and the necessity to further consolidate power against the background of pressure from Russia.

The revised draft of constitutional amendments was discussed by the Parliamentary Committee for Legal Affairs on December 13, and the document will most likely be approved with its first hearing at a special session of the Parliament on December 14. Senior parliamentarians from the ruling party met with President Saakashvili late on December 13 to discuss the issue.

In the revised draft the time period in which elections could be held was reduced by one month. The initial draft, proposed by the President in late October, suggested that simultaneous elections be held sometime between September 1 and December 31, 2008. It will be up to the President to decide the exact date.

The final draft of the amendments stipulates that these provisions for the presidential and parliamentarian elections will be applicable only once, in 2008. After that, elections will be held every five years (presidential) and in every four years (parliamentary) sometime in October or November.

In other changes, unlike the initial draft, the final document says that the President will no longer be the Chairman of the Justice Council. Instead, the Chairman of the Supreme Court will serve as a chair of the Justice Council. A provision depriving the President of the right to appoint and sack judges remains in the final draft.

The constitutional amendments will give the President the right to recall a Georgian ambassador unilaterally without the approval of the Parliament. But the appointment of a new Ambassador will still need the Parliament’s approval.

Initially the draft of amendments also included a provision stipulating a call for fresh presidential and parliamentary elections in case the parliament is dissolved by the president twice within four years. But the authorities decided to remove this provision from the draft.

The final version of the document was prepared after relatively brief month-long public discussions.

According to the current constitution, presidential elections are originally scheduled for April 2009 and parliamentary elections for spring 2008.

The amendments will prolong the current parliament’s term in office for at least five months (if the elections are held in October).

“This is a clear sign of an attempt to usurp power... The only reason why these amendments are being made is election tactics which will help [the ruling party] to win the elections. All the rest [of the reasons cited by the authorities] are just a pretext,” MP Kakha Kukava of the opposition Conservative Party said at the session of the Parliamentary Committee for Legal Affairs on December 13.

Ghia Nodia, of the Tbilisi-based think-tank Caucasian Institute for Peace, Democracy and Development (CIPDD), who was involved in the amendments’ public discussion process, says that prolongation of parliament’s authority “would not be a positive precedent for democracy.”

But key figures in the parliament’s ruling majority say that “a firm political decision” has been made by the ruling National Movement party and President Saakashvili to hold simultaneous elections in 2008.

“There is no secret that the Russian factor is a major reason behind our decision... Our goal is to secure the high legitimacy of a political force, which will win the next elections and to prevent a crisis,” Giga Bokeria, an influential parliamentarian from the ruling party, said on December 13.

Officials say that the next elections should be regarded as a referendum showing Georgian society’s unity against Russia's mounting pressure.

Currently the draft of amendments is being studied by the Venice Commission - the Council of Europe’s advisory body for constitutional issues. The conclusions of the commission are not yet available. Opposition lawmakers argue that there was no need to speed up parliamentary hearings on the issue without the findings of the Venice Commission.

But MPs from the ruling majority say that the Venice Commission’s recommendations will hardly influence the authorities’ firm political decision to hold presidential and parliamentary elections simultaneously in late autumn or winter 2008.