Saakashvili Offers Opposition Deputy Interior’s Post

President Saakashvili said that he had offered the opposition, behind the ongoing protest rallies, to take posts of deputy ministers in some of the key ministries – the proposals, which has already been rejected by the opposition.

Speaking at a live televised session of the government, Saakashvili said that he had offered this proposal while meeting with Levan Gachechiladze, an opposition politician, late on June 9.

He said that although “situation is not ripe” yet in Georgia for a collation government because of lack of trust between the opposition and the authorities, it was possible to offer representatives of, as he put it, “radicals” to take executive posts in some of the ministries.

Saakashvili said that he had told about this proposal to one of the opposition leaders, Levan Gachechiladze, at a meeting late on June 9. He said that the proposal would enable the opposition to observer the situation in the ministry from within, instead of “viewing police as an enemy.”

“I told Levan Gachechiladze yesterday, and I think that he has an ability of rational judgment… let’s appoint a representative of radicals as one of the deputy interior ministers,” Saakashvili said. “Let that person sit in the police headquarters; we will give that person a large office. Instead of shouting from outside [of the Interior Ministry’s building] let them allow their supporters into the building. Police will also see that these people are normal and that not all of them are those who are throwing stones and making graffiti on the walls [apparently referring to youth opposition groups who often make protest slogan graffiti at various state agencies]. We should let them [the opposition] see that we all are part of one system. We do not agree with each other but public order is not a political category. Everybody should want to have order in the country.”

Saakashvili said that the same can be done in the prosecutor’s office, as well as in Justice Ministry (prosecutor’s office is part of the Justice Ministry) and Ministry for Penitentiary and Probation.

He also said that it was possible to allow opposition representatives from both the parliamentary and non-parliamentary parties to participate in the session so of the National Security Council once in a week.

After meeting with the President, Levan Gachechiladze said that Saakashvili offered the same proposals, which he had laid out after the meeting with the opposition leaders on May 11. Gachechiladze said nothing about the proposals voiced by Saakashvili at the government session on June 10.

The opposition leaders, who demanded resignation of Interior and Justice Ministers, Vano Merabishvili and Zurab Adeishvili, respectively, in their joint six-point proposal to the authorities, have already rejected the President’s proposal.

“We will not take part in distribution of posts, because I do not see it as a way out from the crisis,” Irakli Alasania, the leader of Alliance for Georgia, said. “I believe that creation of a proper election environment and then holding of early elections is the way out from the crisis. Which elections – presidential or parliamentary – should come first, that should be the matter of negotiations.”

He, however, also said that the fact that the President started to talk about allowing opponents on the executive posts was in itself positive.

“Even being on the post of the parliamentary speaker [the second highest ranking position in Georgia] I failed to impede creation of the system, which we have today and it is totally impossible to do that from the post of a deputy minister. This is not serious,” Nino Burjanadze, a former parliamentary chairperson and leader of Democratic Movement-United Georgia, said.

At a meeting with the cabinet members, which was held in the Interior Ministry’s newly built headquarters in the suburb of Tbilisi and which was aired live by Rustavi 2 TV, Saakashvili again strongly ruled out holding of early elections. He again reiterated that only the local elections could be held in spring, 2010, instead of initially planned late 2010.

“I repeat we are not a banana state – we have been on the level of Nigeria five years ago, but today we are on the level of the Netherlands and Denmark in respect of level of corruption. In civilized country there are no general elections held once or twice in every year,” Saakashvili said.

He also said that elections required conditions and an agreement on “major rules of the game.”

“Elections are designed to defuse tensions, but for that preconditions should be laid… Neither presidential nor parliamentary elections of last year helped to defuse tensions,” he said.

“In the condition, when the political stakeholders are not agreed on key issues, entering into an election cycle will amount to returning back to hopelessness of 90s,” Saakashvili said.

When speaking on the issue of early elections, Saakashvili also recalled that he had been against of early polls even in 2007 warning that holding of parliamentary elections in spring 2008 was risky in the face of Russia’s possible provocations in the conflict zones.

“Has that same threat disappeared this year? Is not it even easer [now] for the Russian artillery to reach out this place [Tbilisi]?” Saakashvili said and added that Georgia was still in a struggle for de-occupation, facing “existential threat.”

In his speech, which lasted for an hour, Saakashvili also claimed that the ongoing street protest rallies in downtown Tbilisi had led to lose of “at least 10,000-15,000 jobs only in the center of Tbilisi” because of “closed restaurants, shops and a movie theater” in the vicinity of the protest venue on the Rustaveli Avenue. He also said that Georgia’s economy had “lost 1% or 2% as a result of the protests.”

He also spoke about the need of talks with the opposition, despite having “fundamental” and “even cultural differences” with some of the leaders.

Saakashvili has strongly rejected notion of having a political crisis in Georgia.

“There is no political crisis in Georgia,” he said. "What are the signs of political crisis? It is when the government is disintegrated, like it was during Shevardnadze’s [presidency], when the government was like a circus with its members quarreling with each other and incapable to take decisions. Nothing like this is now happening; the government is consolidated. This sign of political crisis is absent."

“The second sign is of political crisis is when the economy totally collapses with the government failing to distribute pensions and salaries. We do not have that sign either,” he added.

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