In the run up to the January 5 snap election, President Mikheil Saakashvili has announced a package of measures guaranteed to be popular with voters. One such populist move is canceling the mandatory use of cash registers by market traders. The controversy over cash registers dates back to spring 2006, when many now familiar opposition faces protested their compulsory introduction. The president, it seems, has now backed down.

Use of cash registers by market traders will now not be made compulsory until July 1, 2009. This postponement is packaged as a way to support the development of small business in the country, but it will certainly go down well with Georgia’s grocers.

This is quite a change of tune on the part of the government. When the law was passed in March last year, former prime minister Zurab Noghaideli said that use of the registers was the only way of stamping out the shadow economy, and legalizing trade at Georgia’s markets.

Needless to say, the opposition is now claiming credit for the authorities’ change of heart.

“The people trusted that the protest actions would bring concrete results,” explained one of the leaders of the opposition Labor Party, Soso Shatberashvili, to the pro-opposition tabloid newspaper Alia.

Yet though the opposition may see this as a victory of their protest campaign, for the government, it could prove a vote winner.