Opposition to Push Imedi TV Issue at Rally

A group of opposition politicians and activists gathered outside Imedi TV premises in Tbilisi, demanding the television station’s transfer, as they put it, to its “legitimate owners.”

Zviad Dzidziguri, a co-leader of the Conservative Party, said at the rally that the Imedi issue would be one of those raised at a protest rally outside Parliament on November 7.

The family of late tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili, who was the founder and owner of Imedi media holding, claim that Patarkatsishvili’s distant relative Joseph Kay, “unlawfully took” the station from the Patarkatsishvili family after the tycoon’s death in February. Ina Gudavadze, Patarkatsishvili’s widow, said at a news conference in Tbilisi on October 28 that the family would intensify its efforts to regain control of Imedi TV. She also stressed that there were no political motives behind the family’s efforts.

The rally outside Imedi TV was joined by a newly established group, under the name of November 7, some of whose members were previously with the Equality Institute. The organization this week held a series of protest rallies outside the Georgian Public Broadcaster, demanding the station air a number of documentary films on the events of last November, when the riot police broke up anti-governmental protest rallies. The GPB, however, refuses to air the films, saying they have already been broadcast by another TV station – Tbilisi-based Kavkasia TV.

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