Shevardnadze’s Relative Sentenced to Pre-Trial Detention

Saakashvili Offers Amnesty in Return for “Legalization of Businesses”

Shevardnadze’s family members accuse new leadership of political persecution.

Court refused bail and sentenced ex-President Eduard Shevardnadze’s son-in-law Gia Jokhtaberidze to three-month pre-trial detention pending investigation. General Prosecutor’s Office accuses Jokhtaberidze of tax evasion.

“It’s a political persecution against our family. It was a stage-show not a trial,” Manana Shevardnadze, daughter of Eduard Shevardnadze and a wife of Gia Jokhtaberidze told reporters after the trial.

“It is illegal, everything is illegal, they persecute us,” Paata Shevardnadze, son of Georgia’s ex-President said.

Jokhtaberidze, who owns shares in Georgia’s biggest mobile phone company MagtiCom, was arrested early on February 20 aboard of a scheduled Tbilisi-Paris flight in Tbilisi airport.

General Prosecutor’s Office, which claims that Shevardnadze’s son-in-low evaded paying 700,000 Lari ($318,000), wants three-month pre-trail detention for Gia Jokhtaberidze. The court hearing is scheduled for February 22.
 
Georgian General Prosecutor Irakli Okruashvili said on February 20, that Gia Jokhtaberidze, who was interrogated for two times in last month regarding the activity of his company, was warned not to leave Georgia, pending outcome of investigation.

Gia Jokhtaberidze, as well as the Metromedia International Group, which also owns shares in the MagtiCom Ltd. communications company, dismissed as groundless allegations over having “problems with the state budget.”

A group of MagtiCom employees were rallying outside the court house in Tbilisi protesting against the detention of Jokhtaberidze and claimed that the arrest was politically-motivated. Ex-President’s son and daughter were among the protesters.

Just one day before the arrest, Gia Jokhtaberidze convened a press conference on February 19 and accused the new leadership of the country “of mounting pressure on business.”

However, as President Saakashvili told reporters on February 20, the new leadership’s goal is “to make business free from corrupt businessmen.”

“That money was monopolized by Shevardnadze’s family from the people and that’s why they should be charged according to the law,” Saakashvili said.

However, earlier the President’s office issued a statement saying that ex-President Shevardnadze would not be targeted and urged the Parliament to pass a law securing Eduard Shevardnadze’s immunity.

President Saakashvili also offered businessmen an informal amnesty in return for better tax discipline.

He said all the companies and businessmen will be offered amnesty, which until April 1 indicate in their tax declarations previously cases of tax evasion and repay the debts.

He said that no criminal charges would be brought against those businessmen, which would “legalize their businesses.”

“I give my presidential word that the relevant corrections will be made to the law and these people [businessmen] will be free from any responsibility, if they pay the previously hidden taxes and legalize their incomes,” Mikheil Saakashvili said.

However this exempt from responsibility will not consider Gia Jokhtaberidze and others, which have been already arrested for tax evasion. Former Energy Minister, ex-Chief of Railway Company, former Transport and Communication Minister and other officials are among those targeted by the new leadership’s anti-corruption drive.

In the wake of Gia Jokhtaberidze’s arrest, his wife Manana Shevardnadze, convened a new conference and said “the political force, everybody knows whom I mean, is mounting pressure on our family.”

She said that her family might appeal “to one of the foreign countries for the political asylum. We do not want to do so, but we have no other chance.”

Manana Shevardnadze denied that her husband was fleeing the county. “He had been setting off on a business trip. The General Prosecutor’s Office gave no warning to him not to leave the country. This is lie. If he wanted to escape from the investigation there are more convenient and secure ways to flee the country,” she added. 

MagtiCom, a mobile phone company, is the Georgian-American joint venture, which started operating in Georgia in 1997. The company was founded by Magti Ltd, owned by Gia Jokhtaberidze and Telcell Wireless of America, owned by the Metromedia International Group. Magti was the third company having entered Georgian telecommunications market. The company has 350,000 users throughout Georgia.

Mark Hauf, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Metromedia International Group, told the press conference in Tbilisi in late January, after Jokhtaberidze has been interrogated for the first time, “the company [MagtiCom] has no debt to the budget. It has already paid GEL 140 million [$63 million] since 1997.”

According to unofficial reports the representatives of the Metromedia International Group will meet Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, who left for the United States on February 22 to discuss MagtiCom’s business in Georgia.