Category: Rustavi2

The thieves fall out at Imedi

March 3, 2010 by georgiamedia

Nana Intskirveli, head of news at the state-funded and controlled Imedi TV station, has walked out of  her job complaining that she was "not valued" at the station - which is run by Mikheil Saakashvili's former chief of staff Giorgi Arevaldze (pictured, right).

Intskirveli was previously the head of the defence ministry's press department and under her direction Imedi regularly battled Rustavi 2's efforts to produce the most slavish pro-Saakashvili propaganda.

Although Imedi and Rustavi 2 are nominally private sector companies, the foreign minister has admitted they receive "state aid" to stay on air. It is though Imedi has never made a profit, having previously been dependent on funding from billionaire founder Badri Patarkatsishvili and now on state funding.

The issue of who actually owns Imedi continues to cause controversy.

In February 2009 Joseph Kay, who claimed to be the owner of the station (itself disputed by the family of Badri Patarkatsishvili), said he had sold the station to investors backed by the Ras al-Khaimah Investment Authority (RAKIA).

That claim was subsequently backed up by Mikheil Saakashvili, whose office said RAKIA were "financing" the buy out of the station.

RAKIA, however, have since denied that they have ever had any stake in the station. And it would now appear the whole story of such a sale was a lie concocted by the authorities with the, at least passive, consent of the government of Ras al-Khaimah, who have formed a close financial relationship with the Georgian state.

At the press conference announcing the sale Joseph Kay produced a man named "Mark Monem" who was said to represent RAKIA. We are still searching for information about the real identity of this man. Click here to find out how you can help.

Will political interests interfere in mining disaster investigation?

March 3, 2010 by georgiamedia

Four Georgian miners were killed today and at least one more is in a critical condition after what is believed to be a gas explosion at Tkibuli mine in the Imereti region in the early hours of this morning.

The prime minister has announced a commission of inquiry but, in contrast to similar disasters - such as the botched demolition of the Memorial of Glory in Kutaisi - there has been no rush to find people to blame.

Instead Nika Gilauri has said that he believes there was no negligence, so appearing to prejudge the inquiry.

So, why the contrast? Could it be becuase the mine is owned by the Georgian Industrial Group, who are also major shareholders in pro-regime national TV station Rustavi 2?

The president has declared 4 March as an official day of mourning for the victims of the disaster.

State of the Nation: Saakashvili's media fig leaf raises more questions than it answers

February 26, 2010 by georgiamedia

President Mikheil Saakashvili's announcement that regional TV stations will have their tax debts wiped out is a small victory for an active campaign to protect Batumi's TV Channel 25 and so is welcome: but the announcement also raises many more questions than it answers about who will benefit and what means the government use to pump what they call "state aid" to national channels Rustavi 2 and Imedi.

Anything that assists media pluralism in Georgia is welcome - not least because it is only with that pluralism and journalists not afraid to tackle those in power that government will be held to account.

In Batumi there seems little doubt that some in the regional authorities were out to smash up a TV station that occassionally asked questions they did not want to have to answer and so prosecuting the station for tax liabilities when it was being run by Aslan Abashidze's cronies was the method chosen to get it ripped off the air.

So it was ironic that the president chose to mention MP Giorgi Targamadze - once Abashidze's crony-in-chief - when he announced a tax amnesty for "television stations in the provincial regions". Straight away the initiative can be seen as another political manouvre to boost the United National Movement's "Second XV" in the form of the Christian Democrats, the party Targamadze leads.

But that is only the start. The use of the phrase "television stations in the provincial regions" is most political of all - because it indicates that the president intends to treat Maestro and Kavkasia, regional TV stations in Tbilisi, differently from all the others.

The president also needs to be asked how many people closely associated with the ruling United National Movement are going to benefit from this tax amnesty? In November Transparency International stated: "according to documents TI Georgia obtained from [the broadcasting regulator]; several ... regional stations are officially owned by people who are closely connected to members of national or regional administrative bodies and high-ranking party officials."

Stopping regional television companies going bust is one thing - allowing them to make a free choice about what they broadcast remains another. Around a year ago several regional TV companies, including Batumi's Channel 25, were relaying Maestro when they weren't broadcasting their own material. Today none of them are. That is no accident and the president has announced nothing that will change it.

And then there is the really big question: just what form the admitted "state aid" received by Rustavi 2 and Imedi takes? When we exposed Grigol Vashadze's confession that the stations were being propped up by the government a panicked regime tried to claim they meant "legal and tax aid" - but there is no separate legal provision for television companies under the tax code and nor is there any clarity as to what sort "legal assistance" TV companies get - especially as Maestro and Kavkasia say they get nothing.

So, the question is now: have Rustavi 2 and Imedi been benfitting from a permanent "tax amnesty"?
 

Regime targets human rights defenders for smears says HRC

February 23, 2010 by georgiamedia

Georgia's Human Rights Centre (HRC) says human rights workers are being targeted for smears in the form of "fairy tales" about how staff of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are working for Russian intelligence.

The HRC says the newspaper "Versia" has taken to reprinting stories made up in Vano Merabishvili's ministry of internal affairs and by Givi Targamadze - the MP whose recent excursion to Ukraine ended in humiliation for the Saakashvili regime - and the parliament defence and security committee when it, as it has just done, accuses human rights defenders of acting as Russian spies.

This story alleged that Arnold Stepanian, founder of Multinational Georgia, received messages from coded text in websites.

But this is only the latest attack.

On 10 December Georgia's public television attacked "Human Rights Priority" for supposedly extorting money from refugees, and on the same day - the International Day of Human Rights - Rustavi 2 attacked the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association for allegedly seeking the release of "Ossetian criminals" from rpison: in fact they argued for the release of illegally detained Georgian citizens (their ethnicity was irrelevant).

Imedi TV has not been immune - earlier this year it compared human rights expert Paata Zakareishvili to members of Stalin's secret police after he travelled to Tskhinvali to investigate the human rights situation in South Ossetia.

State-controlled media recycle Dan Hannan's garbage

February 19, 2010 by georgiamedia

British Conservative Member of the European Parliament Dan Hannan will be the toast of official Tbilisi today after his ludicrously inaccurate blog on Georgia from Wednesday was reported as news.

Describing him as a "journalist" (Hannan does write leader columns for the Daily Telegraph) and not as a politician - presumably because they think that makes him more credible as a commentator - Rustavi 2 yesterday featured the blog on their main evening bulletin (see video).

In fact Hannan's piece contained so many errors it can only be described as fantasy. For instance:

• Hannan said Georgia did not increase borrowing in the global downturn - in fact the rate of borrowing doubled
• Hannan said Georgia's economy had grown throughout the global downturn when it shrank by 4% in 2009
• Hannan claimed current growth was down to the "Economic Liberty Act" when, in fact, its passage has been delayed because it would bar vital economic reforms such as anti-monopoly regulations

Hannan also described Georgia as "free": but in free societies journalists report stories like this for what they are - garbage. It is in unfree societies that journalists report nonsense as truth.