Ivanishvili: ‘I May Quit Politics in Year and a Half’

During a meeting with parliamentary minority group on October 24, incoming PM Bidzina Ivanishvili was asked by a United National Movement lawmaker whether he would quit politics in two years as he had once already said.

“Not in two years, even earlier,” Ivanishvili responded. “I may quit politics in year and a half.”

Ivanishvili said that from the very first day of entering into politics, he was saying that he would remain in politics from two to three years.

“I am in politics for one year already, I mean the time when I was in the opposition,” Ivanishvili continued. “Now after we won the elections I plan to leave the politics in year and a half, but I am not going to leave the country.”

“I will leave behind such a team [in the government], which will deliver on all of our promises, but I won’t give up responsibility over my promises and I plan to be an active member of the civil society,” he said.

“The society should learn how we should elect and how to then keep [governments] accountable; that’s where I plan to stand together with the civil society rest of my life in order to have European type of society,” Ivanishvili added.