It’s rare that a country’s future rests on a single election to the degree that the South Caucasus republic of Georgia’s does on the October 26 vote.

As Georgians headed to the polls, they faced a choice between two radically different visions for the country’s future. One path leads towards Europe, the country’s orientation – backed by overwhelming public support – for the last two decades. The other towards authoritarianism, backsliding and ever-closer ties with Russia, Georgia’s long-time colonial master.

For the past 12 years Georgia has been ruled by the Georgian Dream (GD) party. Founded and led by billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, the party has been underwritten by the oligarch’s vast personal wealth, equal to roughly one-quarter of the country’s entire GDP. While GD had been a pro-Western party – at least in words, if not always deeds – for most of its existence, the past two and a half years have seen it tilt sharply towards Russia and an anti-democratic bent. Following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, GD and Ivanishvili became increasingly aligned with the Kremlin and at odds with Georgia’s erstwhile European partners. Relations with the West have dropped off precipitously in recent months, as the ruling party tightened its domestic control ahead of October 26’s vote.

Ranged against the authorities is an array of opposition coalitions. Welded together by the political leadership of Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili, who has emerged as a staunch government critic over the past year, four main opposition groupings are jointly contesting the ruling party. The largest of these, the Unity coalition, includes the United National Movement, which led Georgia from 2003 to 2012 under then-president Mikheil Saakashvili. Others include For Georgia, headed by former GD leader-turned-opponent Giorgi Gakharia; Strong Georgia, led by banker Mamuka Khazaradze; and Coalition for Change, with major Georgian personalities like Nika Gvaramia and Elena Khoshtaria.

The vote itself was marred by widespread evidence of fraud, intimidation and unfair competition. In one instance, a group of unidentified men attacked opposition voters in a suburb of Tbilisi; in another, Georgian Dream organisers were filmed distributing cash in exchange for votes in the western city of Zugdidi. The most brazen incident occurred in the southern city of Marneuli, long a centre of electoral fraud, where a local Georgian Dream official was filmed stuffing a large handful of ballots into a ballot box.

Despite these challenges, voter turnout was high, coming in at nearly 59% of the electorate, just behind 2012’s record highs. There was widespread optimism in opposition circles that this would enable a genuine defeat of the government, regardless of the hurdles.

Opposition optimism 

The first pivotal moment came as polls closed at 8 pm local time, immediately followed by the announcement of exit poll numbers on local television. The Coalition 4 Change headquarters, one of the leading opposition blocs, was a frenzy of activity as the countdown to the poll announcement trickled downwards. As the tension grew to a fever pitch, the newscasters on the pro-opposition Mtavari Arkhi suddenly appeared on the screen. Behind them, a graphic showed the exit polls commissioned by their affiliate. In first place: Georgian Dream, with a total of 42%. Then came Coalition 4 Change at 18%, Coalition Unity with 13%, Strong Georgia at 9% and For Georgia at 8%. Together, the opposition bloc had – presumably – captured 48% of the vote, enough to enable them to form a government.

The room erupted into cheers and chants. The result predicted would mean the defeat of Georgian Dream, the victory of the opposition and the toppling of the authoritarian government at the ballot box. Hugs and high-fives were exchanged, ecstatic slogans chanted. “We did it all in just six months!” roared one party member in English.

Nika Melia, one of the C4C leaders, was collected but confident as he addressed the media once the initial excitement had subsided. “Today, Georgia has decided to remove the Russian government,” Melia said, using a common pejorative for the ruling party. “Georgia’s new political culture has been established today – a coalition government for the first time ever. Many regimes have resisted the people, and Georgian Dream is no exception, but today, more than 2mn Georgians voted. They made their voice clear and said ‘no’ to the Russian Dream,” he said.

Amidst the optimism, opposition leaders understood that a long road still lay ahead.

“We realise that now is the most important part: defending the votes and actually solidifying our victory,” said Marika Mikiashvili, foreign affairs adviser with the Droa party, a C4C member. “There’s still a lot of room for the government to cheat right now. I would not be surprised for them to fake the results, because we’re not facing politicians. We’re facing thugs, criminals who do not care about their legacy – only power. Clarity from Western observers and Western governments will be crucial in securing our victory,” Mikiashvili said.

Unlike in countries such as Belarus and Venezuela, Georgian authorities do not have the repressive capacity necessary to destroy a mass protest movement against electoral fraud, Mikiashvili added.

“[Georgian Dream] does not have an army,” Mikiashvili said. “The support of the police is also not unconditional. Violence resonates very deeply in Georgian society, and not many police officers would be willing to outright shoot people or something. It’s not how it works in Georgia – not speaking in an idealistic sense, but practically,” she said.

A different picture 

Across town, a different picture of the election – and its results – was unfolding.

At GD headquarters, their own exit polls painted exactly the opposite picture. In this scenario, the incumbents had received a full 56% – enough to easily defeat the opposition and dominate the new parliament. The two results were completely at odds, making the incoming official vote count by Georgia’s Central Electoral Commission (CEC) more uncertain than ever.

As the CEC’s results rolled out, they painted a picture that was not a rosy one for the opposition. The first announcement stated that with 70% of the vote counted, Georgian Dream had received nearly 53%. While paper ballots were yet to be counted (only electronic voting has so far been tabulated), both the remaining ballots and the final tabulation seem unlikely to transform the ultimate tally into an opposition victory. Georgian Dream – at least for the moment – appears to have won.

The entire country now waits to see what will come next. Georgia’s opposition parties have not accepted the results of the election, but neither have they yet announced plans for how they intended to contest them. Mass street protests – long a feature of Georgian political life – seem inevitable, but they have not happened yet. As the clock struck midnight on Tbilisi’s Rustaveli Avenue, the capital’s main thoroughfare and epicentre of every demonstration, there was nothing but silence on the streets. Voting in Georgia may have finished, but the country’s future still hangs in the balance.