Polling stations closed in Georgia on Saturday after the second round of municipal elections in some municipalities, especially in large cities, in a country in crisis whose jailed opposition leader is on hunger strike.
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Mikheil Saakashvili, pro-Western president of this Caucasian country from 2004 to 2013 and now considered the leader of the opposition, was jailed in early October on his return from exile just before the first round of elections.
He immediately began a hunger strike to protest against this detention, according to him purely political, and has continued since.
The United States worried Wednesday about his state of health, the authorities having refused to hospitalize him as recommended by the doctors.
Saturday's poll pitted the candidates of the ruling Georgian Dream party against those of Saakashvili's United National Movement (MNU).
According to polls carried out at the exit of the polls for the pro-government channel Imedi TV, the Georgian Dream would win all the municipalities.
“I congratulate everyone on our victory in the second round, we won all the cities,” Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili said on television.
The pro-opposition channel Mtavari TV, on the basis of other polls taken out of the ballot box, however gave the opposite results and the UNM in the lead.
Its leader Nika Melia called on observers for her party to "defend the vote in the offices" and prevent fraud, while the count was underway.
Saakachvili, in a statement relayed Saturday morning by his lawyers, had qualified as "decisive for Georgian democracy" this day of voting.
Prime Minister Garibashvili called on voters during the week to vote for the Georgian Dream, describing the UNM as “an anti-state and anti-national force”.
The authorities had declared victory after the first round on October 2, while the opposition spoke of fraud - accusations relayed in particular by the OSCE, whose observers reported "intimidation, vote buying and pressure on candidates and voters ”.
Saakashvili's imprisonment has further aggravated, in this former Soviet republic, the political crisis that began with the legislative elections of last year, won very closely by the Georgian Dream and considered fraudulent by the opposition.
The prime minister recently sparked major protests when he explained that the government had to arrest Saakashvili because he refused to withdraw from politics.
The ruling party is regularly accused of using justice to punish opponents and journalists.