Ivanishvili criticizes practices of the ruling administration

Bidzina Ivanishvili spoke of the importance of young people’s participation in the development of the country. At the conference representing the youth wing of the Georgian Dream – Democratic Georgia, he worried of the “nihilism” among the Georgian youth who need to define what kind of country they want to have. Ivanishvili said Georgian politics today is based on “the ideology of one person” referring to the president.

Saying that the current state policy damages the country, Ivanishvili said fundamental changes in the justice system can ensure improvement of the situation, but added that the laws will not be enough if no one obeys them. “[Today] the first violator [of law] is its creator,” he said, referring to the current government and added that it is exactly the government which first of all should support the supremacy of law.

Calling Saakashvili “a professional liar” Ivanishvili wondered how Georgia can be in the top of the list of the most non-corruptive countries when the country is being ruled by one group which controls all the money.

Ivanishvili said the country needs real economic development not only a change of facade. Talking of the clean past of his team members, Ivanishvili said they would break the belief that governance of the country brings wealth as it is today. He said a liberal economy and social solidarity will be natural for the type of country the Georgian dream wants to build and promised that even the people living abroad would return to their homeland and find jobs relevant to their professional background.

Ivanishvili said for the last 20 years the Georgian people have realized what government should not look like. He said it is important that people see the reality in the country and choose “the real future” during the elections. “Whatever Saakashvili does [against us] we will reach our goal,” Ivanishvili said, wondering why he has been fined but added that in three months they will have to return everything.

Proving that the Georgia Dream leader is not the stockholder of the group and has no connection with the shares, Christopher Vasiliadis the lawyer of Qartu Group’s foreign shareholders addressed the Georgian government to cancel the auction. Vasiliadis said on July 9 that the sale of its shares will be considered as an expropriation of foreign investment.

He said Qartu Group has 14 foreign and two Georgian shareholders who will file the suit against the Georgian government in the international court if the selling of their shares planned on July 10 is not be cancelled.

Maia Panjikidze, spokesperson of the Georgian Dream political coalition, said that any step made by the government after Bidzina Ivanishvili’s entrance into the Georgian political arena has been illegal. Panjikidze said that Ivanishvili gave his beneficiary ownership of Qartu Group to his son Uta and other foreign partners “because he knew the nature of the current government.”

She said all the shareholders have no more than 10% shares while the acting legislation does not consider providing the National Bank of Georgia this information.

Panjikidze said that by seizing the Qartu Group assets, President Mikheil Saakashvili demonstrated to the international community how he fights against political opponents and in doing so, only damaged his own reputation.

The National Bureau of Enforcement of the Ministry of Justice stated last week that the shares held by Bidzina Ivanishvili’s JSC Cartu Group (totalling 100% of the company’s outstanding shares with the estimated value GEL 151,880,661) were put up for auction at www.eauction.ge.

The spokesperson of the State Audit Agency (former Chamber of Control) could not provide an immediate answer to The Messenger’s question of how Bidzina Ivanishvili was fined for shares in the Qartu Group if he did not own them. The spokesman however, promised to provide the details about the issue as soon as possible.