Ruling GD member criticizes his party
By Tea Mariamidze
Tuesday, August 27
Georgian Dream (GD) ruling party MP, Bidzina Gegidze criticizes the majority, saying his team has deviated from its four-point plan, which is about justice and freedom.
Gegidze told Kviris Palitra newspaper that there are a lot of negative developments in the country and if things don’t change, society will lose trust towards authorities.
“The fact is we have deviated from the government's four-point plan: justice, freedom, prosperity, development. Freedom should be guaranteed both for the media and the court. In 2012, GD leaders said the law should rule the country, but now we all forgot about it. There can be no legal or political attack on the media,” he noted.
The MP says that if there is no trust in the government, the 2020 parliamentary elections will be useless.
“Many doubts arose. I can't imagine the comfort of being in power today. It was said before that Georgia has been living from election to election but in recent months we have been living from a briefing to briefing. If this reality is not changed by 2020, if positive processes do not start, the public will not trust the court, the 2020 elections will not make sense,” he stressed.
Tbilisi Mayor Kakha Kaladze says that Gegidze’s statement that there is no rule of law in the country is “nonsense.” According to him, changes and approaches that have been made since 2012 by the ruling party is a big step forward.
“Of course, we may also make mistakes. No one is unmistakable, there may be problems in many directions, but we are doing our best to make tomorrow's Georgia better. There will be more prosperity in the country that every citizen should feel,” he noted.
Kaladze added that the GD team has not yet discussed the issue of Gegidze’s dismissal from the ruling party.
Several days ago anti-corruption agency of the State Security Service (SSS) summoned Gegidze for questioning regarding his previous job in the Georgian Post Company, where he was a deputy director in 2014-2016.
The SSS says Gegidze was summoned as a witness and the case was related to his previous work. The process of questioning lasted for 7 hours and the main subject was selling property owned by the Georgian Post via auction. In particular, it referred to the optimization of the infrastructure of the company and relevant processes.
Gegidze believes that the questioning is politically-motivated as he is one of the few GD MPs who supported the demand for the resignation of Interior Minister Giorgi Gakharia after the dispersal of anti-Russian protesters on June 20-21 and also, he is also one of the few GD parliamentarians who opposed the deprivation of opposition MP Nika Melia’s parliamentary immunity.
