23:46, 6 October 2006

Parallel vote count: Georgia's ruling party is the winner

On October 5, the day of local self-government elections, the NGO named "International Organization for Fair Elections and Democracy" held a parallel vote count in five cities of Georgia - Tbilisi, Batumi, Kutaisi, Poti and Rustavi, the "Novosti-Georgia" Information Agency (IA) reports.

Tamar Zhvania, head of the Organization, declared at the press conference on Friday that in all the cities the ruling party - United National Movement (UNM) - was the leader.

In Tbilisi, the UNM won 67.05% of votes, the Block of Conservators and Republicans "Davitashvili - Khidasheli - Berdzenishvili" - 13.14%, Labour Party - 10.75%, "Industry Will Save Georgia" - 6.22%, "Georgia's Way" - 2.82%. One percent of voters cast against all.

It was reported earlier that under preliminary data of Georgia's CEC, a total of 46.7% of all voters took part in the municipal elections. The country opened a total of 3033 polling stations.