Georgia leader seeks to trump rival with mass rallies

The ruling party of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili staged 11 huge rallies nationwide Saturday as he seeks to defeat an opposition billionaire in parliamentary polls next month. Saakashvili addressed tens of thousands of supporters during a day-long dash through towns across the country, culminating in a final showpiece rally in the capital Tbilisi. At the city's Sports Palace, a crowd of more than 10,000, all dressed in the ruling party's red and white campaign colours, cheered wildly as Saakashvili strode to the podium and chanted his nickname: "Misha! Misha!" Many waved national flags and wore party T-shirts emblazoned with "I love Georgia" and the party's ballot-paper number 5. Sounding hoarse after making so many speeches during the day, Saakashvili said the rallies were the "most large-scale action in Georgia's history" and vowed to win the elections. "The result of these elections will be: our people will get more benefits," he said. Parliamentary polls on October 1 are set to be a showdown between pro-Western Saakashvili's United National Movement and the Georgian Dream opposition coalition led by billionaire tycoon Bidzina Ivanishvili, who accuses the president of creating an autocracy. In a swipe at Ivanishvili, who he claims is seeking to return Georgia to the corrupt system which thrived before the 2003 'Rose Revolution' brought his party to power, Saakashvili accused his rival of being unpatriotic. "Those who want to send our country back to the past, don't love Georgia," he said at a rally in Georgia's second city of Kutaisi. Saakashvili also accused foe Russia, which fought a war with Georgia in 2008, of trying but failing to topple his government and prevent Tbilisi forging closer ties with the West. "This spring, Russia sent $2 billion into Georgia, there was an attempt to bribe media, to disseminate huge lies and stage turmoil," he said. Saturday's rallies were a show of strength after a series of similar large-scale events staged by Ivanishvili over the past few months. Saakashvili was accompanied in Kutaisi by his Dutch wife Sandra Roelofs, who made a speech stressing the ruling party's welfare-oriented programme. "Behind your smiling faces there are still a lot of problems; we are going forward with huge steps but more is needed, and there is no doubt that we will do this," Roelofs said in fluent Georgian. Both the United National Movement and Georgian Dream have vowed to reduce unemployment, tackle poverty, improve social benefits and boost agriculture in the impoverished Caucasus state. Saakashvili's allies have sought to portray Ivanishvili as a Moscow stooge because he made his estimated $6.4 billion fortune in Russia. Ivanishvili has denied this, insisting that he shares the ruling party's ambitions to join the European Union and NATO. Amid rising political tensions, Saakashvili has promised that the polls will be the fairest since independence in 1991, although Ivanishvili claims the government is using state powers to boost the ruling party. Most opinion polls have so far suggested that Saakashvili's party has a significant lead over the opposition.