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Georgia’s “repressive democracy”

Petar Kanef, Ph.D. - 10/8/2011

Can Georgia’s active contribution in Afghanistan be the down payment for violation of democratic norms in the country and its admission into NATO?

According to a number of independent experts, today’s Georgia faces a serious discrepancy between Government-led propaganda and actual facts. Thus, according to the President of the country, Mikheil Saakashvili, Georgia is a “beacon of democracy” in the region. The truth, though, is that the large-scale violation of human rights, unbridled impunity of law enforcement authorities, lack of independent judicial system, discrimination and suppression of national minorities, as well as unjustified restrictions of freedom of speech and media have long become the grim reality. Thus, Prof. Nestan Kirtadze, international secretary of the Labour Party in Georgia, defines the Government model, established in the country, as “repressive democracy” and points out that the key support for this model is provided by the local Ministry of Interior, which has practically imposed complete control over the whole population and crushes callously any protests against the ruling authorities. The most vivid proof of the above were the tragic events in Tbilisi in May 2011 which took their death toll.

In a recent interview for RT television, the former Chairperson of the Georgian Parliament and present leader of local political opposition, Nino Burjanadze, accused President Saakashvili of turning Georgia into a typical post-Soviet state and suppressing his own people. “In Georgia right now there's real neo-Bolshevism with all signs of a Soviet regime: violation of elementary constitutional norms, violation of elementary human rights, control of media, police, which are doing everything despite of their legal obligations. In other words, it's a typical Soviet country, where every person who is against the regime is automatically labeled enemy of the country”.

According to Burjanadze, the only noticeable difference from the old Soviet times is that now the authorities’ great enemy is Russia rather than world imperialism. The police crackdown on anti-Government protests in May 2011 was an example of how Saakashvili’s regime is prepared to perform any repressions in order to retain its power.

In his turn the former Georgian Prime Minister (in the period 2005 – 2007), Zurab Noghaideli, leader of the political party “Just Georgia”, defined the regime in the country as “dictatorial” and accused the security services of provoking through their agents the split of his party - the Movement for a Just Georgia - at end-2010. As a matter of fact, it is common practice in today’s Georgia for the authorities to deal with their political opponents through fabricated court cases or even direct physical intimidation such as the pressure, exercised over one of the Labour Party leaders in Kutaisi, Badri Porchkhidze.

In his analysis, published on 5th August 2011 in “Washington Times”, the former U.N. ambassador for the Republic of Georgia, Irakli Alasania, points out that “Georgians know democracy and freedom exist in Georgia in name only”.

By the way, President Saakashvili is also well aware of the fact that the implementation of true democratic reforms in Georgia would mean weakening of his own power. Therefore, he is desperately trying to make his Western allies and the US in particular close their eyes for the absence of actual democracy in his country. This in itself is the main reason for the decision for maximum enlargement of Georgia’s involvement in the actions, undertaken by the coalition that operates under the aegis of NATO on the territory of Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, even among the circles of Saakashvili’s patrons in Washington there are growing concerns that Georgia is becoming slowly but surely a totalitarian state. Particular testimony to this can be found in the analytical report of the US Ambassador in Tbilisi, John Bass, elaborated in February 2010 and published in WikiLeaks. The eminent Georgian expert on security, Irakli Sesiashvili, points out that Baas has explicitly stated in his report that “Saakashvili considers his future insecure – this is why he aims at maximum enlargement of Georgian contribution in Afghanistan in order to guarantee the benevolence of the West”. Yet, the ambassador highlights the fact that if Georgia fails to strengthen its democracy such substantial troop commitment in Afghanistan could prove too risky and counterproductive. Furthermore, he does not consider that the Georgian Government can view its active contribution in Afghanistan as the “down payment for the violation of the democratic norms in the country and Georgia’s admission into NATO”. As Baas himself points out, “this is just an illusion”.