According to GYLA, the purpose of cutting a state funding for parties due to political protests is to punish the opposition

Date: 23 Dec 2020

The Georgian Young Lawyers' Association has submitted a report (conclusion) to the Parliament on the amendment to the Law on Political Associations of Citizens. According to the amendment, the party will not be able to benefit from state funding: 1) if it does not fully employ the mandate or at least half of the mandates of the Member of Parliament assigned to it; 2) if half of the members of the Parliament elected by its nomination miss all the plenary sittings of the previous year of the current convocation for an unreasonable excuse.

Funding of parties from the state budget primarily serves to ensure a legal capacity of parties. It does not only serve to promote the party's parliamentary activities. Political parties and candidates need to have access to monetary means to convey to voters their goals and vision for politics, and at the same time to get information about the views of the people.

Against this background, according to the project initiated by the ruling party team, deprivation of state funding for parties is perceived by the organization as an arbitrary punishment by the government for the opposition.

GYLA calls on the Parliament to take into account the goals and purpose of state funding of parties, do not allow the emergence of disproportionately restrictive, unjustified norms of political parties in the legislation and not to adopt the submitted bill.

For more details, you can see the report (conclusion).