MP Levan Machavariani: Bullying worked, and foreign handlers placed an order, forcing Transparency International Georgia to add Saakashvili to their political prisoner list

“The bullying worked, and an order was presumably placed by their foreign handlers, forcing Transparency International Georgia to add Saakashvili to their list,” stated MP Levan Machavariani, a member of the parliamentary majority.

“We recall that when Saakashvili was not included on the list of political prisoners, he began bullying Eka Gigauri and representatives of the remaining wealthy NGOs. Presumably, that bullying worked. Given that these wealthy NGOs were no longer brazen enough to include Saakashvili in that list, since there might be around 20 to 30 people across Georgia who still believe in these NGOs, and they did not want to lose those 20 to 30 people, the bullying nevertheless worked; an order presumably came down from their foreign handlers. As a result, they were forced to add Saakashvili to the list.

They are appealing to the claim that the nine million spent by Saakashvili is allegedly just the ‘suitcase ’, in an attempt to trivialise the matter. Nine million was certainly not spent on suits; millions were spent on his personal luxury, travel, and holidays,” stated Machavariani.

For context, Transparency International Georgia released a statement confirming that former President Mikheil Saakashvili will be added to their compiled list of political prisoners. According to the organisation’s assessment, “the guilty verdict delivered in the so-called ‘suits case’ is unsubstantiated and unjust, while ongoing legal proceedings against him are politically motivated, as a result of which Saakashvili meets four out of the five criteria defined for a political prisoner under Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) Resolution 1900 (2012).”

Notably, Transparency International Georgia previously compiled a similar list of prisoners, which did not include the former president. Mikheil Saakashvili himself criticised that decision at the time. “Utterly shamefully, Transparency International – Georgia did not include me in the list of political prisoners. I hope honest NGOs will emerge who will speak out against this injustice,” Saakashvili wrote at the time.