On March 28, while talking about the Anti-Discrimination bill at the government meeting, Prime Minister of Georgia, Irakli Garibashvili, voiced a new initiative: “I am proposing an initiative to insert a clause in the constitution, defining family (Prime Minister probably meant marriage) as a union between a man and a woman. This is what Latvia did, and last year Croatia introduced the same amendment, before entering the EU.”
Prime Minister also clarified, that this decision was made in order to avoid any “misinterpretation” of the Anti-Discrimination law: “Despite the fact that Georgian legislation already defines family as a union between a man and a woman, in order to avoid misinterpretation, I believe it is desirable for this Constitutional amendment to exist. “ [1]
In addition, we can conclude from the Prime Minister’s statement, that the position of the Equality Inspector, was eliminated from the version of the Anti-Discrimination bill which was presented by the Ministry of Justice to the civil society organization in 2014. This change will significantly lower the effectiveness of this law in terms of implementation.
It can be said that, in the past few decades, this is the first serious setback in terms of the legal situation of LGBT persons in our country. We would like to remind you that homosexual acts between men were decriminalized in 2000, which was followed by introduction of prohibitory norms of discrimination in the Labor Code and the Georgian Law on Healthcare. In 2012, the Criminal Code of Georgia was amended making commission of a crime based on animosity towards LGBT persons an aggravating circumstance.
Despite this, Georgian legislation and practice still present some gaps, which place LGBT people on an uneven footing in comparison to the rest of the Georgian citizens. These gaps often become the reason for LGBT group’s discrimination and violation of their fundamental rights. The adoption of the Anti-Discrimination law and other accompanying processes were supposed to ensure the elimination of these gaps. In addition, in 2013 the Georgian government started working on the National Human Rights Strategy and Action Plan, which, alongside with the improvement of the legislative base, was supposed to be directed at the improvement of implementation mechanisms and presented to the Parliament for adoption in 2014.
The Prime Minister’s statement made on March 28, regarding the constitutional amendment as well as the weakening of the implementation mechanism of the anti-discrimination bill, makes it clear that the steps made by our Government are merely an accompanying expression of the wish to integrate with the European Union and do not represent the result of a well thought through anti-discrimination policy.
Moreover, this statement directly points at the fact that the government does not have a united political will, which would enable the adoption and implementation of the Anti-Discrimination law, or the National Human Rights Strategy and Action Plan in this country.
At the same time, considering the high levels of homophobia and transphobia in Georgia, the Prime Minister’s initiative, as well as the statements made by public figures regarding his proposition, should be evaluated as the threat of encouragement of discrimination and violence against LGBT persons.
Response of representatives of Parliament and executive government to the Prime Minister’s initiative:
Minister of Justice, Tea Tsulukiani stated: “The Prime Minister introduced an excellent initiative. As you may know it is already included in the law, and same-sex marriage is not allowed. The Prime Minister believes that we should also take it to a higher level and solidify the definition of marriage as union between a man and a woman in the Georgian Constitution.” [2]
Aleksi Petriashvili (the State Minister of Georgian on European & Euro-Atlantic Integration) ”The initiative introduced by the Prime Minister, while not providing anyone with new rights, does not deprive anyone of their existing rights. The Prime Minister introduced this initiative for discussion and it was supported by the government. The final decision will be made in Parliament. However, I believe that this is a very timely and important initiative, and it is certainly very important that Georgia has been improving with recommendations from the International Community and considering interests of all the citizens. [3]
Vakhtang Khmaladze (Chair of the Legal Issues Committee at the Parliament of Georgia): “no one is banning sexual minorities from doing whatever they want, but whether it [their relationships] should be considered a marriage is a completely different issue. Due to this, in addition to a whole set of different rights, this law considers the marriage to be a union only between a man and a woman, and enables only them to create a family. I believe that this approach to the law is favorable and bringing it to a constitutional level is a great decision, since it will be a higher level of protection. It is easier to change a law and much harder to change the Constitution, thus what is protected by the constitution cannot be changed in law. I believe that in this case, the Prime Minister’s initiative corresponds to the demand of opinions that have been voiced by society.” [4]
The representative of the Parliamentary Minority Levan Bezhiashvili evaluated the Prime Minister’s initiative as a tribute paid to the MP’s that oppose European integration and he believes that “there is no necessity of reflecting this [the definition of marriage] in the Constitution, however if the initiative is introduced it will not find any opposition [in Parliament] [5]
