Pardoning Mikheil Saakashvili would damage President's image, Kobakhidze says
By Liza Mchedlidze
Wednesday, December 28, 2022
The Chairman of the Georgian Dream party Irakli Kobakhidze was asked about former president Mikheil Saakashvili by reporters after the presentation of the government's 2022 report. He refused to discuss Saakashvili's case and assessed the whole situation as a 'simulation', noting that the 'simulation' was planted to create a basis for the President of Georgia, Salome Zourabichvili to pardon the ex-president.
Irakli Kobakhidze called experts researching Mikheil Saakashvili's health condition as 'questionable' and added that it is 'logical' to involve such experts because the whole thing, according to him, is a lie.
"I don't want to talk about Saakashvili today, it's not something that interests the public. The public is interested in the topics that the Prime Minister spoke about. When dealing with simulation, you sometimes have to involve experts of questionable reputations.
All this is a logical continuation of the simulation. We are dealing with a 450-day simulation, and at such a time you have to involve experts not of high reputation, but of questionable reputation. The sole purpose of this simulation is to create a pretext for pardon. As a rule, the simulation should not be the basis of anything," Kobakhidze said.
According to Kobakhidze, the decision to pardon Mikheil Saakashvili, who he called 'recidivist', will damage the image of the president. He gave an example of Salome Zourabichvili pardoning certain people in the past, which, as Kobakhidze said, has damaged the reputation of the president.
"When it comes to the fact that pardoning a recidivist will be damaging to his image, there is no threat here. You remember that Salome Zourabichvili pardoned specific people in the past and this damaged her image. In this case, this step will be even more damaging," stated Kobakhidze.
