“Due to social hardship and rising prices, there are already families in Georgia for whom even buying eggs for Easter has become a problem. Excuse me, but for whom are you growing this economy — for your own Easter tables? Where is this increased economy going?” — said Tata Khvedeliani, a deputy from “For Georgia,” addressing members of the Georgian Dream party at a plenary session of Parliament.

According to her, after Georgia’s Prime Minister, Irakli Kobakhidze, promised to reduce prices, March data shows that the price of bread products increased by 9.6%, vegetables by 4.9%, meat by 9.6%, dairy products and eggs by 4.5%, and fish by 21%.

“I would like to wish each of you a happy Easter. Easter days in Georgia have always been a symbol of unity, faith, and hope. I am sure each of you celebrated this day appropriately, because your pockets have not been affected by the increased price of eggs, the higher electricity tariff, or rising prices of other products. Unfortunately, I cannot say the same for a large part of Georgia’s citizens. Due to social hardship and rising prices, there are already families in Georgia for whom even buying eggs for Easter has become a problem. Not to mention other products.

At the tragicomic price-monitoring commission, one of your members, the chairman of the commission, who is officially a millionaire, stated that you may not be able to reduce prices, but apparently, you know very well how to grow the economy by a few percent month to month. Excuse me, but for whom are you growing this economy — for your own Easter tables? People are interested in where the results of this economic growth are. If the prices of products have increased, electricity has become more expensive, fuel and medications have risen in price, and car clearance costs have gone up, where does a citizen of Georgia see the benefit of this economic growth? Or where is this increased economy going?

After your Prime Minister promised to reduce prices, March data shows that bread products increased by 9.6%, vegetables by 4.9%, meat by 9.6%, dairy products and eggs by 4.5%, and fish by 21%. Electricity tariffs have also increased by 30%.

That this person’s promise or word cannot be taken seriously was also confirmed by your honorary chairman, when during Mr. Aliyev’s visit, the country’s Prime Minister was placed somewhere in the corner, and then these photos were deliberately displayed for everyone to see, with the message to the public: ‘Call it whatever you want.’ Every time each of you crosses the line here and tries to present yourselves as something you are not, I advise you to look at those photos and reflect on your real role within the ranks of ‘Dream.’

Our team gave you the opportunity to genuinely address citizens’ socio-economic problems and support our initiative that a Georgian worker should not be cheap labor and that the minimum wage should be more than 1050 GEL. This would have been a social guarantee enabling people to meet their basic needs, but you refused, arguing that our initiative was allegedly unsubstantiated.

Therefore, we initiated the creation of a temporary parliamentary commission to study the socio-economic effects of introducing a minimum wage. You can support it, and if you did not like our justifications, let us discuss it together and determine what the minimum wage in Georgia should be. But we expect nothing from a government that forgives 1 billion GEL to energy companies while increasing electricity tariffs for Georgian citizens by 30%,” Khvedeliani stated.