On September 26, 2016, an election subject “David Tarkhan-Mouravi, Irma Inasvili United Opposition of Alliance of Patriots of Georgia” has submitted a claim to the GNCC against TV Company “Rustavi2.”

The subject of dispute was an issue regarding cancellation of pre-electoral free political advertisement of “David Tarkhan-Mouravi, Irma Inasvili United Opposition of Alliance of Patriots of Georgia”  from the broadcasting net of TV Company “Rustavi 2” on September 24, 2016. 

In accordance with the public statement of “Rustavi 2”, according to the company’s assessment, video ad was of a xenophobic content, which was the reason of its cancellation. TV Company has replaced disputed video advertisement with another ad submitted by the same election subject.

An election subject believes, that “Rustavi2” had no authority to cancel from its airtime, nor assess pre-election political advertisement, because in accordance with the Paragraph 6 of Article 51 of the Organic Law of Georgia “on Elections” general national Free-to-Air broadcaster is obligated no later than on the 50th day before polling, allocate through its airtime at least 7.5 minutes every three hours for the placement of free pre-election advertising equally and without any discrimination, on a condition, that allocated advertising airtime during this period shall not exceed 90 seconds for per electoral subject (election subject may divide this time into multiple parts). In accordance with the Paragraph 3 of Article 63 of the Georgian Law “on broadcasting” the advertiser is responsible for the content of pre-election political advertising.

An election subject “David Tarkhan-Mouravi, Irma Inasvili United Opposition of Alliance of Patriots of Georgia” was requesting from GNCC to study issues and the relevant respond on them. The requests were following: 1. to assign  TV Company “Rustavi 2” the airtime recovery  of the advertisement of “David Tarkhan-Mouravi, Irma Inasvili United Opposition of Alliance of Patriots of Georgia” 2.To compensate an election subject with free airtime defined by the Georgian legislation.3.To draw a protocol of administrative offenses against TV Company “Rustavi 2” for the violation of the rules of the placement of political/pre-electoral advertising.  However, during the review process, only the request to draw a protocol of administrative offenses has remained in force.

After an actual review of an issue with the participation of interested parties, GNCC has determined, that TV Company “Rustavi 2” has replaced the ad of “David Tarkhan-Mouravi, Irma Inasvili United Opposition of Alliance of Patriots of Georgia” without election subject’s agreement and therefore, has violated obligations defined by Paragraph 6 of Article 51 of the Organic Law of Georgia “on Elections.” According to the Commission’s decision, protocol of administrative offenses shall be drawn for “Rustavi 2” and later transferred to the City Court (Tbilisi) for the further response.  

It should be noted, that the compliance of  the ad of an election subject “David Tarkhan-Mouravi, Irma Inasvili United Opposition of Alliance of Patriots of Georgia”  with the Paragraph  3 of Article 45 of the Organic Law of Georgia “on Elections” according to which election program shall not include war and violence propaganda, violent overthrow of the current state and social system using the force, the territorial integrity of the country, national hatred and enmity, religious and ethnic confrontation is being studied by the Central Election Commission of Georgia.