Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has announced the creation of a "special anti-corruption commission" to "oversee and check" the activities of high-ranking members of the government that will be accountable only to him and Parliament Speaker Nino Burjanadze. He made this announcement at a special cabinet meeting on 4 October. He said the move was conditioned by the escape of a former Defence Ministry official wanted on suspicion of involvement in an alleged money laundering scheme in connection with which former Defence Minister Irakli Okruashvili has already been charged.
At the beginning of the meeting Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili said that Iason Chikhladze, the former head of the Procurements Department at the Defence Ministry, had managed to elude law enforcement and flee to Russia. He said that Chikhladze had flown to Russia from Turkey, where he had been together with Okruashvili and former Deputy Defence Minister Aleksandre Sukhitashvili. He added that Sukhitashvili's whereabouts were currently unknown.
Saakashvili was particularly alarmed, assessing Chikhladze's flight as a major breach of security: "Keep in mind, people, that we are talking about the head of procurements at the Defence Ministry - a person who knows all manner of secret information about Georgian defence purchases. This man has ended up right in Moscow.
"What do they need intelligence for if when we arrest someone here, the main holder of information goes directly to the FSB (Russia's Federal Security Service)? Now we can let all kinds of intelligence officers in. There is no problem anymore. They already know everything that has been happening up to now. They know that which is the best protected secret for all countries. Our defence sphere is essentially open - we are talking about tactical and operational schemes which all countries have and which are the privilege and secret of all countries. How did we get to the point where one of the most important people at the Defence Ministry, a person who had all of this information, was someone who came from criminal circles named Wolf, or some such awful thing? A person with a nickname, with a criminal reputation and with a criminal past."
Saakashvili said that the incident had led him to create a special anti-corruption commission to oversee top-level government members' activities. "I have decided to create a special anti-corruption group under the president which will be accountable only before the president and which will periodically report to the parliament speaker, but only the parliament speaker. It will not be subordinated to the Interior Ministry or the Prosecutor's Office or some other agency. It will work with your agencies and the Audit Chamber, but it will be directly subordinated to the top officials in the country. Do not take offence, but its main function will be to check and oversee each and every one of you, including your loved ones and families and so on. We have all been taught such a lesson that we have no alternative," he said.
Also at the meeting, Finance Minister Nikoloz Gilauri said he would soon propose a package of draft amendments that would abolish several customs fees and simplify several "outdated" regulations. Saakashvili responded by calling on all ministers to cut regulatory red tape in their respective agencies.
Gilauri said that Georgia had achieved 12.5 per cent economic growth in the first six months of 2007, adding that "this tendency is continuing". He said that thanks to economic growth and improved tax administration "we can say confidently that we will have additional resources this year of approximately 350m lari."
Saakashvili announced that, given rising prices on natural gas, electricity, public transport and flour, the country's "most vulnerable groups - pensioners and teachers", would receive special government assistance to offset the growing cost of living. He said that teachers and pensioners living in cities would receive a one-off 50 lari aid payment to cover electricity payments and the same amount for gas. Members of these groups living in the regions, meanwhile, will receive free flour and vouchers for gas and electricity. He stipulated that only those who receive pensions less than 100 lari would be eligible for the assistance. He said that approximately 100m lari would be allotted for this purpose.
Saakashvili also proposed the re-launch of a special apprenticeship programme first implemented in autumn 2006. Under the initiative, the government paid salaries of 150 lari per month to work for three months in private businesses and receive on-the-job training. He said that this time the programme would be envisaged for 100,000 people who would receive "minimum salaries" for five to six months.
Asked for an update on the progress of this year's grape harvest, Agriculture Minister Petre Tsiskarishvili said it was "going much more successfully" than that of 2006. Saakashvili responded by issuing a warning that "Georgia's enemies" including "one-celled domestic traitorlettes (Georgian: "moghalatukebi")" were "lying in wait" hoping for the failure of this year's harvest.
He also praised today's "successful" visit by NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer: "The visit by the NATO secretary-general was very successful. Some people find this irritating. But when they are irritated we are in a very good mood. I have come to take this very mean view. Sometimes mean ideas such as this go through my head. If Georgia's ill-wishers are anxious, that means Georgia is on a very good path. My function is not to calm them. My function is to ensure that they are even more anxious.
"Our task is to continue on our path towards peaceful unification - both the country's reunification and our unification with Euro-Atlantic and other democratic structures not to spite someone, but rather to ensure of our country's future. We need to speed up the pace of the democratic reforms we have planned. The NATO secretary-general's visit was even better than I could have imagined," Saakashvili said, adding: "of course there is a lot of work left to do."
Press Office of the President of Georgia