Simultaneous parliamentary and presidential elections in Georgia will be held sometime between October and December 2008, according to constitutional amendments passed by the Parliament with its third and final reading on December 27.

It will be up to the President to announce the exact date of elections.

The amendments will prolong the current Parliament’s term in office by at least six months and will also cut President Saakashvili’s first term in office from three to six months.

The amendments also set October 2008 as the new date for legislative elections in the Adjara Autonomous Republic. Originally, the authority of Adjara’s Supreme Council would have expired in June, 2008.

Opposition parliamentarians argued that prolonging the current parliament’s term in office is an undemocratic precedent, adding that constitutional amendments are being misused by the ruling majority for the further consolidation of power under the pretext of foreign threats.

The ruling National Movement party justified the simultaneous elections by the desire to prevent potential interference by Russia in Georgia’s election process.

But the opposition lawmakers’ arguments were backed by a conclusion of the Venice Commission – an advisory body of the Council of Europe on constitutional issues.

In its conclusions, which were circulated in the Georgian Parliament on December 22, the Venice Commission said that political reasons are not sufficient to justify the prolongation of the mandate of a sitting parliament.

“A convincing constitutional justification for such an amendment would be to provide in the Constitution that presidential and parliamentary elections are to be held jointly as a general rule and not only on this one occasion. The draft Constitutional Law does not however contain such a rule,” the Venice Commission said.

The constitutional amendments say that this rule of holding simultaneous presidential and parliamentary elections will be applicable only once, in 2008.

But the Venice Commission recommendations had little influence in practice. The ruling National Movement party made it clear even before the recommendations were unveiled that the proposed amendments would go into force regardless of the Venice Commission’s opinion.

The constitutional amendments grant the President the right to schedule elections anytime between October 1 and December 31, 2008. The Venice Commission said that this three-month period is “clearly excessive.”

“The discretion of the President should therefore be limited to a short time period not exceeding two or three weeks,” the Commission said.

Another constitutional amendment approved by the Parliament on December 27 addresses the President’s revised role in the judiciary system.

According to the document, the President will no longer be the Chairman of the Justice Council – a body overseeing the judiciary system. The Chairman of the Supreme Court will instead serve as chair of the Justice Council, and the President will no longer have the right to appoint or sack judges. This amendment was hailed by the opposition lawmakers.