Major source of information is TV

Caucasus Resource Centre CRRC carried out polling in March-April on media issues in which more than 2000 respondents were asked. The results showed that the interest of the population towards news is high. 83% follows the news by TV on national channels, and for 88% of the respondents TV is their primary source of information whereas only 5 % see the internet as their main source. Printed media was the main source of information for only 2%. The most popular TV companies are Rustavi 2- 88% and Imedi- 85%. Third runs Public Broadcaster -34%. Only 6% watches Maestro and 9% for Kavkasia TV which are mainly transmitted in Tbilisi. 43% of the respondents think that Imedi serves the ruling power interests and 53% believe the same interest is served by Rustavi 2. As for Kavkasia and Maestro, the respondents think that both of them serve opposition. 43% of respondents trust Rustavi 2 news while 42% trust Imedi. Of those asked, 42% think that there is no freedom of expression and there is no freedom of speech in Georgia.