If we want our country to grasp the chance of joining the EU, the Government must think about their people and not only about their own selves – Vakhtang Dzabiradze

InterPressNews sat down with political expert and constitutionalist Vakhtang Dzabiradze to discuss acute issues of Georgia’s internal and domestic policy.

--The Government has submitted a report to the legislative body on enacting a new law under which the officials will be tenured after attestation. The employs of local self-Government bodies that have not been tested thus far will undergo this process until July 1, 2015. Only 3.5% of officials within the self-government agencies were subjected to attestation, others were simply granted their posts. Indisputable is the fact that the potential officials’ skills and qualifications must be tested; however, do you think that this move from the Government will yield any positive result? As you remember, under the Nationals, they tested all employees but finally only the advocates of the National Movement managed to perch on high posts …

- By all odds, a decision to test public officials is right and rational. However, the problem lies in the fact that the leading political power has always used attestation to its own benefit and to the benefit of its adherents – they have always granted high posts to their favorites. And precisely because of such an irrational personnel policy, we have always been faced with a one-party system of governance in our country. And, as a rule, this corrupt system of governance is formed when political organizations are merged with a state; thus, willingly or unwillingly, we are dragged back to that profligate empire of the Soviet Union from the far-reaching tentacles of which we have always tried to escape.

The Government and the public are stuck in an impasse today – on the one hand, the attestation of the public officials is mandatory and on the other hand, we are faced with the aforementioned problem. And if the Government and the public don’t manage to get over this stalemate, a standoff between the authorities and our people will be inevitable. Everyone knows that such a system does not work and it apparently cannot be deemed as democratic. However, this is nothing new -- they introduced this system in Georgian under the Nationals, under Shevardnadze, under Gamsakhurdia; they implemented this system in the Georgia of Communists… A leading political power has always helped its advocates in occupying high posts. Government has always been manned with those who stood by the powers that be… Hence, they must handle this issue with kid gloves; they must try to avoid all the possible risks that may prevent them from leveling the playing field for each and every applicant; the Attestation Commission must also be manned with consummate professionals only. In a nutshell, I think that the personnel policy is the Achilles’ heel of our Government, and if we fail to achieve positive changes in this direction, nothing on earth will see us through from this dead-end critical situation. Thus, attestation must be held extremely carefully and objectively.

- It would be reasonable if they held attestation for each and every public official and not only for those who are employed within the self-government bodies. Don’t you think that highly qualified officials and quintessential professionals’ fate must not be determined with the final outcome of the election? Don’t you think that the time when their personnel policy must be subjected to a serious reconsideration has come?

- If you want me to pin the problem down, then I will state that our state agencies abound with political posts that are held by those officials who are replaced as soon as Power changes hands in our country. And today we must simply single out political posts from the ordinary ones. We must also stipulate all criteria based on which they single out officials. This is a complex issue though and needs thorough analyses.

In my mind, each and every official must undergo an attestation the recommended interval of which must be two or three years. In case, the applicants have equal qualifying marks, a job must be given to an inpidual that is already employed within the body. Thus, the attestation must be held extremely carefully – each detail must be planned beforehand.

In addition, Attestation Service must work in a 24 -hour regime; they must be always be on call and must also test those who long to be given a job within a public service agency in the future.

They must create a database of potential replacement for the officials of a body. This will enable them to grant posts within the Ministry only to those who had undergone attestation. This mechanism would uproot the corrupt practice of nepotism and eliminate all chances of establishing a one-party system, which that is detrimental to the country.

--Unfortunately, after Saakashvili’s Government was overthrown and a new force came into power, its representatives got down to distributing flagrantly boosted bonuses. And this issue has become a topic of ongoing debate within the public. Ex-PM Ivanishvili has expressed his overt dissatisfaction over their flagrant behavior. As reports fly, more that 140 million GEL has been channeled into our high officials’ pockets. And the fact that our Government has passed these official reports by as something unimportant immensely surprised us. What kind of comment could you release regarding this subject?

-- I have also listened to Ivanishvili’s comment regarding this issue and I do agree with it completely. When you are a high official in Georgia, in the country, where a number of people live a hardscrabble life, you must not act like an ultimate scoundrel and must not seek to satisfy your voracious appetite at the expense of your destitute people. Unfortunately, our well-heeled high officials are not interested in this issue in the slightest. And their move to ignore the mishaps of their own people has produced these terrible repercussions. However, it is also worth noting that the present bonus distribution practice was instilled by the former Government. And immensely deplorable is the fact that our public has failed to study the “anatomy of the National Movement”– they do not know the inns and outs of this body thus far. However, our authorities’ decision to preserve this corrupt practice does not really speak well of them. Regulating this system and setting everything in order here is possible though.

“I am for granting high salaries to our top officials. However, this does not mean that they must enjoy astronomical salaries. The acts from some officials have clearly pointed to the fact that the situation in this sphere is really catastrophic. And the Government should apparently have assumed the responsibility of dealing with this issue before the situation became aggravated to such a great extent. Only endless talks regarding the renovated bonus system cannot really settle this issue. And you know what, not the former PM but the acting one must have responded to our officials’ arbitrary steps negatively.

Like the majority of our people, I also was shocked when our officials’ decision to channel astronomical money that an average Georgian cannot accumulate for 5 years into their bottomless pockets became known. And their acts must be regulated not only by the law … Our acting PM must also harshly respond to them. These people even dared to state that they have not gifted themselves with these bonuses; in their words, they have accumulated them, it’s nonsense! Only an ultimate scoundrel can issue such disgraceful allegations.

- Their decision to summon Gigi Ugulava to the Prosecutor’s Office again has sparked massive uproar from the National Movement and spurred them to accuse the present authorities of subjecting them to political persecution. Unleashing political persecution against a political rival is inadmissible from the authorities but it’s also a fact that our officials must pay the price for their committed misdeeds… otherwise; any official can easily be set to performing different misdeeds…

- The news editions of July 1 informing us regarding Gigi Ugulava’s troubles were immensely interesting from this point of view. This news was followed by the comments from the National Movement. The second part of these editions also informed us about the pending imprisonment of the French ex-president. And when they pose the question of what fuels our aspiration to join NATO do you know what we must answer? We must bring the French ex-presidents pending detention as an example and must tell them that Europe does not single out presidents from ordinary people and does not give them immunity from punishment if they are accused of misfeasance or committing any other crime. And if we want to make them hold their tongues, if we want them not to utter a word regarding political persecution we must move closer to Europe.

The Nationals do claim that Ugulava abided by the law; however, they don’t say that the law itself is corrupt to the core. Actually everyone knows how they laundered black money; everyone knows perfectly well that the Tbilisi City Hall officials were permanently on the make… We would have avoided a number of our present troubles if the present Government would have studied the inns and outs of the National Movement, if they learned each detail with regard to their ruling style and passed exhaustive information in relation to this issue on to us. We will stick to this stalemate for good, if they don’t try to bring about any positive change in our country. When the Georgian Dream took the helm of the country, I supported those who claimed that the new top officials must have started everything over … Thus, I was not for forcing the Nationals to pay the price for their past sins; however, if we have started this process, we must undoubtedly see it through. If we do not take this step, our problems will never end…

-The issue of abolishing a moratorium on alienating Georgian land has been made a point of hot discussions. In your opinion, what made them take this step and actively sell our land without comprehending the pending threats this move can pose to us? As reports go, they have offered as much as 172 thousand hectare of agricultural land for sale. The price of one hectare of our land runs up to 625 GEL. Don’t you think that by establishing such a low price, our Government is squandering our most valuable resource?

-- They have failed to adequately draft and enact the law on local self-government bodies; they have failed to determine the term local. This land is not the property of local self-government bodies and precisely in the wake of this the necessity of offering 170 thousand hectare of land for sale has emerged instantly. We all know which body has taken this step. However, a logical question really pops up here: why is the Ministry of Economy doing this? Do they aim to fulfill some kind of task as fast as possible? Alienating one hectare of our land for 625 GEL is truly a travesty.

Do the employees of the Ministry of Economy have their heads in the clouds? Don’t they know that the population around the world is gradually increasing? Are they so gullible that they cannot realize that this move of theirs will bring us close to a catastrophe after 10 or 15 years?

As for our energy system… how can we indulge in selling our hydro resources? Our hydro plants must be in the hands of our Government. Are they strongly determined to build a “Hydonhess” Hydro power station? All right, we have nothing against this. Clearly though, the funds to build this hydro power station must be allocated from the state budget and it must be the property of the country and its citizens; to cut it short, the newly built hydro plant must not serve as a source of a complementary income for some officials. African nations have even banned them from selling water. And tell me what the hell we are doing here in Georgia. We are selling our land! Can this be defined as a reasonable step? Are we the only country around the world that has refused to pursue the national interests? What the hell is going with us?!

-- The landmark deal with the EU has been sewn up and everyone maintains that Georgia must not miss the chance of integrating itself with the EU. In your opinion, what core objective must the country set for itself to join EU?

-- Over the last 20 years, we have incriminated the North as the cause of our mishaps and have forgotten to pick holes in the measures our Government has taken so far.

Certainly, the implementation of the Association Agreement will not be an easy challenge to negotiate. We will have to alter everything in the country, and first of all we will have to change our attitude towards each other, to business as well as to our Government… If the political overtones in terms of the West remains unchanged, if this government adopts the same stance to the West as our other former authorities, we will definitely be faced with a number of problems. Why pin blame on Russia that is an embodiment of evil even without this?

Our future is in our hands today. If the Government takes heedful and rational steps, we will manage to get over the present impasse. If they want our country to grasp a historic chance of joining the EU, the Government must think about their people and not only about their own selves.

Koba Bendeliani

InterPressNews