Ex-President Saakashvili: Dictatorship will inevitably fall; wolves have grown up, preparing to end the reign of jackals and hyenas
“Yesterday marked one of the greatest tragedies in Georgia’s modern history: the fall of Sokhumi. We constantly recall those tragic events, and our enemy constantly reminds us of them, telling us: don’t you dare fight or lift a finger, because you will lose anyway; you will be subjugated anyway. I came here today to tell you—subjugation is not in our genetic code. We are not pushovers, and you cannot subjugate us,” stated the former President of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili, at today’s court hearing.
According to Saakashvili, the Georgian nation was born for freedom, democracy, victory, and success.
“Right now, we don’t have any alternative to victory. If we look back at Sokhumi and Abkhazia, what happened there was the absolute peak of what went on in the 90s: namely, the coup, statehoodlessness, crime, treason, fragmentation, and international isolation that brought us precisely to the tragedy of Sokhumi and Abkhazia. I often travelled to Sokhumi and Abkhazia in 1992 and until the summer of 1993. I didn’t hold a gun; I was assisting Gia Baramidze with the exchange of captives. Funnily enough, I actually grew this beard out of respect for him, as a sign of solidarity, because lately I’d been constantly criticising his beard, thinking it aged him. As it happens, Levan Khabeishvili did the same, so Levan has a beard and moustache now as well.
I remember Sokhumi of that time very well. First, I remember the Sokhumi of my childhood: eating Adjarian khachapuri with my mother on the Sokhumi boulevard, walking in Gagra with my great-grandmother and great-grandfather; the lightness, the colour. And I remember wartime Sokhumi, a completely black-and-white, dead city. At that time, I was going back and forth for prisoner exchanges. I remember the day Sokhumi fell.
Many compare Abkhazia to the 2008 Russo-Georgian War. The only thing they had in common was our people’s unprecedented heroism. In every other respect, 2008 was the absolute opposite. Unlike the 1990s, we had a real army this time. Russia was forced to drop its mask, mobilise the entirety of its armed forces, and carry out open aggression, inflicting immense damage on its own reputation. They invaded, of course, to conquer the whole of Georgia, to kill me, to halt Georgian reforms, to put an end to the Georgian success story and the nation’s true hopes and dreams, and to radically alter Georgia’s course. Lavrov stated this directly in a conversation with Condoleezza Rice on 8 August 2008: ‘Our objective is the destruction of Georgia.’ They could neither destroy nor subjugate Georgia then; they failed to realise any of their goals. The Georgian state and its government stood firm, and it was right after the war that we set our course toward European integration.
In fact, just two years after the 2008 war, we became the world’s number-one reformer. I say all this because our struggle is, first and foremost, a struggle for the truth, including historical truth, to defeat lies,” stated Mikheil Saakashvili.
According to Mikheil Saakashvili, “the truth is that in 2008, Russia suffered a catastrophic defeat.”
“What else do you call it when a country a trillion times larger attacks a small neighbour, fails to make a dent in its statehood, independence, freedom, or political course, and fails to achieve a single one of its objectives? The year 2008 is a brilliant example of our refusal and inability to be subjugated.
Russia was defeated then because our state institutions were strong, the people were united, and we had many powerful friends, as Georgia was a beacon of freedom and democracy for the entire world. That is precisely what Putin cannot digest; that is precisely why Medvedev and Lavrov constantly bring me up. That is why, completely innocent, I have been in prison for six years now, inside this constant circus into which you have been turned as performers. Meanwhile, the Georgian Dream figures, a breed intentionally cultivated in a Russian colonial incubator of pushovers, cheats, and traitors, constantly harp on about 2008 to cover up the tragedy currently happening to us in reality: namely, the attempt to plunge Georgia back into the swamp, chaos, and hopelessness of the 1990s.
The 1990s were a time when crime reigned supreme in Georgia; Jaba Ioseliani hooked a large portion of our youth on crime and drugs, and gangs and law enforcement agencies alike robbed the people. The Rose Revolution put a decisive end to all of that. Organised crime was reduced to zero, street crime was neutralised, and a new law enforcement system emerged in Georgia that protected the people and was free from corruption. Ivanishvili, like Jaba, hooked our youth back on drugs, employed them in predatory call centres, and instructed the police and security services to oversee it all and bring him his cut. When Liluashvili held back his cut, he was punished. It is no coincidence that Kakha Targamadze, the man behind Shevardnadze’s primary 1990s criminal syndicate, has recently forged family ties with Ivanishvili.
In the 1990s, people left Georgia en masse. During my presidency, more returned than left because hope was born. Ivanishvili killed that hope and openly urged Georgians to escape. He is also building Arab cities where Georgians will not even be able to stick their noses in, where even the service personnel will be brought in from India and Bangladesh. For those who need reminding: Tbilisi spent centuries under Arab rule, and King David the Builder spent 30 years to liberate and return it to the Georgians. What is more, two of our cities, Tbilisi and Batumi, are becoming entirely inaccessible to Georgians, whose views from old apartment blocks are blocked by new skyscrapers where flat prices reach USD 20 million. In these cities, groceries have become exactly three times more expensive since my presidency; working Georgians can no longer support themselves through their labour and are forced to move to villages or, more realistically, flee abroad. Their places are taken by predatory Russians arriving in booms with their businesses and lifestyle, convinced that anything they fancy belongs to them, unable to tolerate anyone different from them. The term for this is gentrification, cleansing cities of their indigenous population.
If in the 1990s we were driven out of Abkhazia by force of arms, now we are being driven out of our country by Russian and Arab money, by the money of the Ivanishvilis, Pkhakadzes, Gilauris, and Chkhartishvilis. What right does Ivanishvili have to expel us from our country? What right do Russians and Arabs have to drive us out when Georgians have no other country besides Georgia? Did we snatch Adjara from the hands of the pro-Russian separatist-feudal Aslan Abashidze and the Russian army and units in the 1990s, and develop it so rapidly, only for Ivanishvili to sell it to Arabs and Russians? Did we open the doors for so many talented youngsters after the Rose Revolution just to watch the country get trampled on by the likes of Garibashvili and Mdinaradze? In my day, I completely wiped out drugs: a single pill of Subutex went for three thousand dollars, and you couldn’t get hold of it anywhere. Ivanishvili has dumped all sorts of killer drugs under every single tree, and for practically nothing. We transformed education, cleared out decades of corruption, and set a course for Europe. Ivanishvili axed the American Technological University project, shut down Iliauni, and brought back backhanders in schools and chaos in higher education.
Ivanishvili has failed at everything, including failing as a dictator, because a real dictatorship implies strict, sometimes brutal order and excludes chaos. The man from Chorvila generates chaos daily; he thinks dictatorship means throwing people, more and more people, into prison, and beyond that, he can manage virtually nothing. I must say directly that we will turn into a failed state with a failed dictator perched on top. All of this rests on the concept forced upon us by the Russians: that Georgians were born for crime, corruption, and serving and entertaining Russians, and that freedom and statehood are an unacceptable luxury for them because Georgians are single-celled pushovers. But I tell you: we are not pushovers. We must say out loud: ‘They cannot subjugate us; we will not be subjugated; we are not pushovers. We are the nation of David the Builder, Tamar, George the Brilliant, Heraclius, Ilia Chavchavadze, Georgian Social Democracy, Zviad Gamsakhurdia and the National Movement, the Rose Revolution, and the recent massive demonstrations. We are the nation of 17th-century Kartli-Kakheti and the 19th and 20th-century rebellions of Guria, the workers’ movement of Tbilisi and Batumi 100 years ago, the 1924 uprising, 14 April 1978, and 9 April. Therefore, we cannot and will not be pushovers—and to whom? To a weakened empire and its comical puppet, Borya Ivanishvili? Not a chance. I, Mikheil Saakashvili, tell you that we will end the restoration of the 1990s misery; security will return, and drugs and crime will disappear from our courtyards, streets, and schools.
Corruption will be forever erased from our existence and mindset. I say this as a leader whose alleged hidden wealth was searched for across the entire world, without finding a single stolen tetri; how could they find what does not exist? I say this on behalf of that great group of idealists who were never for sale. USD 20-million flats will no longer be built in Georgia, but every Georgian family will have a decent home and job. Many foreigners will come to Georgia, but they will come as tourists, as guests—a guest is from God—and not as masters of this land. 100% of today’s clinics were built by me, and these clinics will serve the people completely free of charge. The full income will no longer settle in the pockets of greedy clinic owners, but will be redistributed to doctors, nurses, and orderlies. Our farmers will no longer have to stand with outstretched hands; they will be equipped with modern technologies that will bring them high incomes. And most importantly: fear of the government must never again dictate our behaviour and motivation; respect for the law and humanity, yes, but not fear of the government,” stated Mikheil Saakashvili.
Mikheil Saakashvili added that his primary weakness, as well as his main strength, is his love for his homeland.
“It was that very love that made me cross the sea exactly five years ago in a completely hopeless situation, back when the people were not fully ready. But now the situation is different. Now I want to confirm to you 100% that Georgia is 100% ready for change like never before. Subjugation is not in our genetic code; rather, it is the love of freedom and refusal to accept slavery. I am not calling on anyone to overthrow the regime. I am simply telling you: no matter how many people you imprison who call for an overthrow, it will change nothing. I tell you this as an inevitable fact: the dictatorship of the Chorvila back alley will inevitably fall, and it will happen very soon. The failed dictator is protected by a pack of lapdogs, jackals, and hyenas. Yet our name, by which the world knows us, derives from the Persian ‘Gorg’ (wolf)—Georgia, Gorgasali. ‘Algeti’s wolf pups shall grow up once more’… The wolves have grown up; the wolves are preparing to end the reign of jackals and hyenas,” declared Mikheil Saakashvili.
After concluding his address, Mikheil Saakashvili and his supporters performed the Georgian national anthem in the courtroom.