Georgian President seeks new draft

Georgian President Saakashvili on Wednesday submitted to parliament a draft of a new constitution that would limit the power of the presidency. The opposition has opposed the move, and some speculate that Saakashvili is “pulling a Putin”: empowering a prime ministership for himself to occupy once his term ends. This is a perverse side effect of term limits that we have seen in a number of cases in recent years, as commented earlier by Daniel Lansberg-Rodriguez. The ironies abound if Saakashvili is indeed adopting the same strategy as Putin: the legacy of the 2008 war between the two countries continues.