Georgia: Unclear Future for South Ossetia's Pro-Tbilisi Leader

When Russian forces occupied South Ossetia in August, a two-year initative by Tbilisi to win back the hearts and minds of Ossetians seemed to collapse instantaneously. The primary instrument in those efforts was the Tbilisi-backed administration of Dmitri Sanakoyev, who claimed authority over mainly Georgian-populated pockets of the separatist-minded territory. The future of Sanakoyev's parallel authority is now up in the air.

Sanakoyev, 39, has not returned to his "capital," the village of Kurta, since war broke out on August 8. As the months drag on, some Georgian analysts and former associates are now questioning whether he ever will return. Even so, he is still thinking like a political leader. In the wake of the Georgian-Russian conflict, he has stated that his chief responsibility is to help provide for the tens of thousands of residents forced from their homes in South Ossetia's villages during the war. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. "[W]e received over 60,000 refugees who need to be resettled, put in new homes. The alternative government is doing all it can, in cooperation with the Georgian government and international organizations, to help those people so they are resettled and prepared for winter," he said. "[That] means that they are moved into warm, good apartments with all [necessary] conveniences." [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Sanakoyev maintains that his administration will continue to claim the role as the representative of Ossetians and Georgians who were forced out of their homes in South Ossetia. But, as the failure of October talks demonstrated, both Russia and the separatist government that now controls all of South Ossetia refuse to negotiate with Sanakoyev's entity. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

A negotiating deadlock over the issue of Sanakoyev's participation in talks appears to be deepening. State Minister on Reintegration Temur Iakobashvili told EurasiaNet that the Georgian government will not participate in talks about "the future" of the region without Sanakoyev and his government. "They [Sanakoyev's administration] will take ? part in the negotiations because our principle is very simple: we cannot talk about the future of the region if all communities are not represented there," he said. "[W]hen you are talking about the future of the region, you have to engage all communities in the region."

Georgian officials considered Sanakoyev's arrival a strategic coup when he was elected in late 2006 as president of Georgian-controlled South Ossetia, an election meant to deflect attention from a parallel vote that reinstalled separatist leader Eduard Kokoiti as the head of Ossetian-controlled South Ossetia. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Sanakoyev was promoted by Tbilisi as the legitimately elected alternate to Kokoiti and the separatist leader's pro-Russian policies. It was a tactic that did not meet with success within separatist-controlled South Ossetia. Residents there interviewed by EurasiaNet before the war routinely referred to Sanakoyev as "a traitor."

Sanakoyev himself blames the war for his government's inability to seize the momentum from Kokoiti's government. "[W]e created this alternative power, an alternative government to show local people how the administration of South Ossetia can work with the Georgian government, to show how Ossetians and Georgians can live together," Sanakoyev told EurasiaNet in a recent interview. "But I think we also lost because the war happened."

Some Tbilisi-based analysts and former Sanakoyev associates now conclude that the experiment failed. According to one former member of Sanakoyev's government, the administration never had enough authority to fulfill its mandate.

Uruzmag Karkusov, the former prime minister in Sanakoyev's government, argues that the administration was never given enough "rights" to fulfill their mandate. The "key" to the South Ossetian conflict, he added, is not in Kurta or Tskhinvali, the South Ossetian capital, but in Tbilisi.

"We wanted to resolve some economic problems, but I can say openly [that] everything did not go as planned," Karkusov said. "[I]n order to realize one's ideas, one must have the right to do so. Even if you are smart, even if you are professor, even if you have a lot of ability, if you don't have any rights, no one is interested."

Now a deputy economic development minister in the Georgian government, Karkusov served in Kurta for a little less than a year before being "reassigned" to Tbilisi.

Zurab Bendianishvili, an expert in the Georgian parliamentary Commission on Territorial Integrity, agrees that the Sanakoyev administration was "limited" in its ability to do anything.

"I don't think that everything was very successful, although basically what was done -- concerning the economy and social aid -- that was all correct," he said. "The fact that war ... occurred ... it can be said that it was not the fault of that administration. They could not have any sort of influence on that situation. They did not have the possibility to do something themselves. They were limited."

Giorgi Khutsishvili, a founder of Tbilisi's International Center on Conflict and Resolution, also notes that the Georgian government did not put enough "effort" into the Sanakoyev "project."

"In the first phase, the project was promising," he said. "It was aimed at developing an alternative system, making them an alternative for the South Ossetian people. But even before [the war] there was not enough effort from the Georgian government and the project broke up."

Mamuka Areshidze, an analyst working on Georgia's conflict issues, believes that the Sanakoyev administration missed a lot of opportunities. "[T]he general line of the alternative government was not correct. ? I believe in the first place it was necessary not to build the 'capital,' Kurta, but to put money into agriculture," he said. "It would have been more effective than all those movie theaters and concerts for the population of Kurta." [For details, see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Iakobashvili dismisses allegations that either the Georgian government or Sanakoyev's administration were unsuccessful. Skeptics, he charged, are "personally motivated" to find fault in the Kurta project because it did not coincide with their own ambitions. "They wanted to play a larger role, they wanted to control something else, I don't know," he said. "I think the rights and responsibilities it was given were sufficient ? there is only one measurement in this kind of thing: did people deliver or not?"

Iakobashvili maintains that the fact Sanakoyev was "attacked" by Russian media is proof that he was successful. "The very fact that Sanakoyev's government was seriously attacked by the Russian media and Russian propaganda, and the fact that everything happened in South Ossetia means that it was working, the soft power of Sanakoyev was working," he said. "It was delivering."

But now, after the war, it is uncertain what Sanakoyev's role will be. Analyst Areshidze forecasts that his chances for maintaining his position are limited. "They may find some use for him," Khutsishvili said. "On the one hand, he was presented as the alternative actual leader of South Ossetia. On the other hand, the whole peace process has changed. How are you going to use [the new peace process] with the old part?"