President’s Anti-Corruption Proposals
As anticipated, Mikheil Saakashvili submitted to the Parliament on 27 January, two days after being sworn in as a President, a package of bills, envisaging, as the officials say “drastic measures against corruption.”
The bill implies confiscation of assets of those officials who fail to prove assets were acquired legally. The amendments also simplify the procedures of arrest of those officials suspected in bribery. A 22-page package of bills implies to amend 12 laws.
“We urge the Parliament to discuss these bills as soon as possible. We hope that the Parliament will make a relevant decision at the very first session,” Secretary of the National Security Council Vano Merabishvili said, adding that “the current authorities keep the pre-election promise regarding the fighting corruption.”
Under the amendments a prosecutor has a right to make a deal with the suspect in order to reveal other high officials allegedly involved in corruption. Thus, the bill would allow prosecutors to release, or mitigate the punishment for alleged corrupt official, who will supply information or evidence of crimes that they or colleagues committed.
The authorities claim that this kind of deal between the suspect and the prosecutor is widely used in the western countries and represents an effective mean of struggle against organized crime.
“The Prosecutor’s Office does not rule out use this method regarding ex-chief of the Railway Company Akaki Chkhaidze [who is under the arrest now for alleged fraud and tax evasion],” Prosecutor General Irakli Okruashvili said.
Many legislators admit that the shadow tradeoffs between the suspect and the prosecutor has always been occurred, that was the source of corruption.
“Now this should be legalized in order to use this tradeoff to investigate more grave crimes committed by the high-level officials,” MP Zakaria Kutsnashvili of the Socialists parliamentary factions, which is in the opposition of the new authorities, told Civil Georgia.
The second important issue included in the bill implies confiscation of property of high rank officials if the court proves that it was possessed illegally. Now the only means of monitoring the officials’ property is their financial and property declarations.
Each Georgian official is obliged to submit a property declaration annually. This information is open and available for any citizen of Georgia. However, as many experts say, the property declarations of many officials are far from reality. Very often an official has much more property than indicated in the declaration.
The bill would allow prosecutor for filing civil suits against officials suspected of bribery, requiring them to prove that their assets were acquired legally. If he fails to do so, the court will rule to confiscate the official’s assets, which will be handed over the state.
The draft over the confiscation of illegal assets from the officials will be discussed by the Parliament for the second time. Mikheil Saakashvili submitted the draft law to the government for consideration in 2001, while being on the post of Justice Minister in the Shevardnadze’s government. However, the proposal was rejected by the most of the government members, including President Shevardnadze.
Later the issue was raised in the Parliament, when in 2002 MP Mikheil Saakashvili managed to submit it to the Parliament for consideration. However, Saakashvili, supported by the reformer’s team in the Parliament failed to endorse the draft, as the pro-Shevardnadze MPs were against, claiming that the proposal was “bolshevism.”
It is anticipated that the draft will face no major opposition in the Parliament now, taking into consideration the current political situation in the country. Even many supporters of the previous government, who voted against the draft in 2002, intend to vote for the proposal now.
The package of bills also stipulate that detained officials may not adduce ill health as an excuse for not answering prosecutors’ questions. The bill also implies cancellation of immunity for the employees of the law-enforcement agencies, high rank officials of the Autonomous Republics and Chairman of the Chamber of Control, which is the main governmental watchdog and audit agency.
It is anticipated that the package of anti-corruption bills will be discussed by the Parliament this week.