Tag Archives: Georgia

Political row envelops Georgia’s city statue to lovers

TBILISI/Georgia, SEPT. 18 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — A row has erupted in the Georgian Black Sea town of Batumi over damage to a statue of the South Caucasus’ most famous lovers — Ali and Nino. The opposition UNM party, the political machine of former president Mikheil Saakashvili, has accused the ruling Georgian Dream coalition of deliberating damaging the statue it erected in 2010.

Batumi has become a political battleground since 2012, when the Georgian Dream won a parliamentary election. Mr Saakashvili had treated Batumi as a pet project, lavishing cash, ornate buildings and grand designs on the city.

Now, though, the UNM accuses the Georgian Dream of pulling down many of these projects to undermine Saakashvili’s legacy in the city.

In a Facebook post, Mr Saakashvili, who is now the governor of Odessa in Ukraine, said that under the guise of moving the statue, the Georgian Dream had irreparably damaged it.

“Today, with the support of Russian oligarch Ivanishvili, the moving statue Ali and Nino was destroyed.” he said. The Georgian Dream has dismissed the allegations. The statues of Ali and Nino had been sited at the entrance to Batumi’s harbour, a prominent position in the city.

Ali and Nino was first published in 1937. It detailed a love affair between the Muslim Azeri Ali and Christian Georgian Nino, and is supposed to symbolise eternal love and understanding between nations.

The statue was designed by Georgian artist Tamara Kvesitadze.

Lincoln Mitchell, a Tbilisi-based political scientist, explained just why Batumi attracted so much attention from the Georgian Dream.

“The UNM government spearheaded a dramatic modernisation of Batumi, a city that 15 years ago was a sleepy coastal town led by a nasty warlord.” he said.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)

Inflation rises in Georgia

SEPT. 16 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Producer prices have risen by nearly 10% in the past year in Georgia, the country’s statistics office said. The main driver of the inflation was a sharp increase in prices of electricity, water and gas, rises all linked to the fall in the value of the Georgian lari.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)

Georgia’s court rules on pretrial detention

SEPT. 16 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s Constitutional Court ruled that it was illegal to keep a person in pre-trial detention for more than 9 months. The ruling is a major victory for the former mayor of Tbilisi Giorgi Ugulava who is accused of corruption. He is a member of the UNM and has said the accusations are politically motivated. Mr Ugulava has been in pre-trial detention for 14 months, after one of the charges was altered.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)

Georgian winegrowers protest against falling prices

SEPT. 11 2015, TBILISI (The Conway Bulletin) — Several hundred farmers protested in the ancient winemaking region of Kakheti in eastern Georgia, demanding that the government increase subsidies for harvested grapes.

Eyewitnesses said that the demonstrations were passionate and angry but peaceful, although some protesters brawled with police after tension boiled over. There were no reports of any injuries and only three people were detained but the unrest does show how the former Soviet Union’s economic malaise is deepening.

A grape farmer attending the protests told broadcaster Rustavi2 that they will not back down, but that people are afraid.

“I demand a rise of prices. People are afraid of this government, they do everything to keep us quiet. What should we do?” grape farmer Murtaz Gorkhelashvili said.

The price for a bunch of grapes has fallen by 40-55% this year because of a fall in wine export to Russia and Ukraine.

Western-imposed sanctions on Russia and a sharp fall in oil prices have tipped its economy into recession. A civil war has heavily dented Ukraine’s economy.

In 2014 wine production accounted for 2.5% of Georgia’s GDP, a higher proportion than France, even, where wine makes up around 0.9% of GDP.

Independent consultant and freelance wine writer Caroline Gilby described how important wine is to Georgia’s economy and also to its national identity.

“Wine is economically critical to this small country with its limited natural resources,” she said.

The government subsidy, an election promise by the Georgian Dream coalition in 2012, of an extra 0.35 lari per kilo of white grapes and 0.15 lari per red grapes for farmers is considered insufficient by the protestors.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)

Tea factory opens in Georgian capital

SEPT. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Geoplant, the largest tea-producing company in Georgia, opened a $2m plant in Tbilisi’s western district of Ozurgeti. The government scheme ‘Produce in Georgia’ provided the funding for the construction of the tea sorting and packing plant. The company said the sorting plant will help it increase export capacity. Geoplant owns the Gurieli brand of tea. It was established in 1996 and set up the Gurieli Export brand in 2010 to boost sales.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)

Remittances fall in Georgia

SEPT. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Money transfers to Georgia in August measured $84.4m, a drop of 35% from 2014, media quoted the Central Bank as saying. Russia and Greece are the main generators of remittances for Georgia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)

Georgian PM lauds China

SEPT. 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – In a speech at a World Economic Forum event in the Chinese port city of Dalian, Georgian PM Irakli Garibashvili described ties with China as very strong. China has invested heavily in Georgia, building up infrastructure and trade links. It views the South Caucasus as part of its longer term strategy.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

US wants closer military ties with Georgia

SEPT. 8 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A senior US military officer said he wanted US forces to increase the number of exercises they hold with Georgia. Media quoted Lieutenant General Ben Hodges saying he wanted to increase the “quantity” and “frequency” of drills between the two countries. The Georgia-US drills have irritated Russia.

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(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Georgian rebel region deals with Venezuela

SEPT. 8 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Venezuela, one of the few countries which has recognised the self-declared independence of the Georgian rebel states, has signed an agreement with Abkhazia on visa-free travel, media reported. The Georgian foreign ministry denounced the agreement.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)

Georgia approves Tbilisi electricity price rise

SEPT. 3 2015, TBILISI (The Conway Bulletin) — Following earlier electricity price rises in Georgia’s regions, the state regulators approved a similar price increase in the capital.

For the Georgian Dream, the ruling coalition, the price rise means they have barely been able to fulfil one of their promises from the 2012 parliamentary election – to cut the price of electricity and to keep it low.

But, as Akaki Tsomaia, economics professor at the University of Georgia explained, the plunging value of the lari had forced the regulators to agree to the price rise.

“Georgia is experiencing a 45% depreciation of its currency against the US dollar. Electricity and gas providers in Georgia have no other way than to increase the price of these services. Otherwise we will definitely have a major electricity shortage,” he told the Bulletin.

Still, this assessment, which is widely shared, didn’t stop the opposition UNM party blaming the coalition.

“The absence of professionalism led us to this point,” UNM’s deputy chairperson Nika Melia told TV broadcaster Rustavi-2.

Electricity prices have triggered protests in the region, most notably in Armenia where thousands protested earlier this year and forced the government to waive price rises.

In Georgia which is known for its street level politics, however, the population seems to have accepted the rise more quietly although some people did expect protests shortly.

Vladimir, an IT specialist walking along Tbilisi’s central promenade said: “People will probably start next month once they get bills.”

Irakli, 37, who was waiting at a bus stop, agreed but he said that politics, was the key driver of social unrest.

“We’ve taken to the streets so much in the recent two decades, but for other reasons,” he said. “But it all accumulates and only needs one non- social spark to explode.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)