1/ THREAD about how you lose your party votes by making statements in the wake of war.

Hours after #Azerbaijan’s attack in #NagornoKarabakh former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili made a statement in support of Aliyev. https://mediamax.am/en/news/politics/39575/

2/ This statement came a month before important parliamentary elections in #Georgia. Saakashvili was nominated for prime minister by his UNM party.

In private conversation party members made attempts to mitigate consequences. But they never went public to voice their concern.

3/ Elections in Georgia took place two days ago. Results are now final and they demonstrate that Saakashvili’s party largely failed to receive support in the region with the ethnic Armenian population.

4/ In 2016 parliamentary elections this was the most successful UNM polling station. This year UNM received 16 times less.

Instead of UNM, votes went to other opposition parties, particularly European Georgia.

5/ That could help ruling Georgian Dream party too. Its leadership did not take sides in #NagornoKarabakh war.

In 2016 this was the most successful polling station for the ruling party. They got there only 52 more votes this year.

6/ In one of his post-vote interviews Saakashvili voiced traditional concerns about "vote buying" and "grave violations" in the ethnic Armenian region.

No matter what happened in the past, he will have hard time to convince anyone after his pro-war statement.

7/ I haven’t looked at results from the polling station in places mainly populated by ethnic Azerbaijanis. Would be interested to get insights from there too. END