Georgia: Political Storm Brewing Over Future of National Broadcaster Rustavi2
Georgia’s top opposition-minded channel, the influential Rustavi2, claims that an October 1 court ruling that freezes a majority shareholder’s stake in the company will lead to the television station’s closure.
“Today we are as close to ceasing broadcasts as ever,” Rustavi2 Director Nika Gvaramia said at a news conference. “All sources of financing have been shut down,” he said.
A fierce critic of the ruling Georgian Dream Coalition and supportive of the opposition United National Movement, Rustavi2, the country's largest private TV station, has been bogged down in a property dispute with a former shareholder, Kibar Khalvashi, for some time. The dispute led the Tbilisi City Court first to freeze Rustavi2’s assets and, now, the 51-percent stake held in Rustavi2 by the channel’s majority shareholder company, Sakartvelo.
The freeze interrupted the sale of the company to a new owner, who, Gvaramia claimed, was planning to invest $6 million in the national broadcaster.
That new owner, Dimitri Chikovani, is the brother-in-law of ex-Defense Minister Davit Kezerashvili, a Saakashvili-era cabinet minister who was granted political asylum in France after being prosecuted by the Georgian government on various criminal charges.
Gvaramia, a former justice minister under ex-President Mikheil Saakashvili, alleged that the court’s decision was the work of former Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili, the billionaire-founder of Georgia’s ruling Georgian Dream coalition, and the man many Georgians see as the real power behind the Georgian government.
Ivanishvili has made plain his dislike of Rustavi2, terming the clearly pro-Saakashvili broadcaster a political “agitator” determined to discredit the government and prompting other media outlets to do the same.
Neither the government nor Ivanishvili has responded to Rustavi2’s allegations. Both, however, have underlined in the past that they do not interfere in media matters as watchdogs allege occurred under Saakashvili’s administration.
Those claims will likely do nothing to reassure critics now. Watching the conflict over Rustavi2 erupt, Lasha Tughushi, editor-in-chief of the daily Rezonansi, was succinct: The situation “is not good for anyone” . . . .and “will not bring anything good.”
Giorgi Lomsadze is a journalist based in Tbilisi, and author of Tamada Tales.
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