President Saakashvili criticized his cabinet members for their lack of having “direct contact with the people” and slammed lower level bureaucrats for being “scared, inactive and unreasonable.” Some opponents regarded this criticism, publicly voiced by the President, as mere “Public Relations” on the eve of the two-year anniversary of the Rose Revolution, while others noted that this might be a sign of possible changes in the government.
Mikheil Saakashvili was speaking at the government session on November 2 and this portion of the session was broadcasted live by the Georgian television stations.
“We were able to eradicate corruption in the government and in all the major structures. But I think we have serious problems in respect of direct contact with the people. None of the Minister – there are a few exception – ever answer phone calls. The Prime Minister always answers phone calls, whoever is calling – including a common citizen… This is not gossip; if I call you from a different phone number and not from mine, you never answer me, except Kakha Bendukidze [State Minister for Reform Issues]. I do not remember [Healthcare Minister Lado] Chipashvili answering any phone calls. You are not emperors; you are Ministers of small Ministries in a small country. You must answer any questions [put forth by] our citizens and must always be among the people. Tbilisi Mayor [Gigi Ugulava] has started going to the office via subway and bus and I welcome this very much… There must be full interaction with the society… Do not hide in your offices, because those Ministers who will hide in their offices will very soon be sacked,” Saakashvili said.
Two days earlier the President convened regional governors and criticized them for the very same reason. At a meeting on October 31 Saakashvili instructed the governors to hold regular public meetings in their respective regions within the next two weeks in order to find out, as Saakashvili put it, “what are the expectations of the population [and which ones] have not been met after the [Rose] Revolution.”
The cabinet members were also criticized by the President on November 2 for having inflexible bureaucracy, which as Saakashvili put it, “tortures” ordinary citizens, especially in the regions. “It is a long and burdensome process to get any kind of permit,” he added.
He said that although “there are no bureaucrats who take bribes, there are bureaucrats who can not make decisions.”
“A scared bureaucrat – because of a fear of [Interior Minister Vano] Merabishvili or [Prosecutor General Zurab] Adeishvili – does not take bribes, but he also does not want to do something useful. There are thousands of cases like this. The reality now is that we have a scared, inactive and unreasonable [group of bureaucrats]… Bribe-taking is punishable, but not the initiative,” Saakashvili said.
“Very good reforms are underway in the Ministry of Justice… But go and try to get a passport, for example, in Telavi [a town in the eastern Georgian region of Kakheti] and you will see how you will be tortured and how many times you will have to apply and see whether the revolution has occurred in this sector. And what reason did the [Rose] Revolution occur at all if a resident of, let’s say, the village of Akhalsopeli has to go to Telavi twenty times to apply for a passport?” Saakashvili said.
He said that the government should understand that ordinary voters brought them into the office and “we must learn to serve these people.”
“So please wake up and work in this direction,” he added.
MP Koba Davitashvili who leads the opposition Conservative Party and who is a former ally of President Saakashvili says that this, as he described it, “public reprimand” was just PR. “It was just a show. He [the President] lies and people know this very well; it is no longer possible to deceive people,” MP Davitashvili told Civil Georgia.
MP Levan Berdzenishvili of the opposition Republican Party noted that this was the first instance when the President publicly criticized the government.
“Of course this was a clear sign that the President is dissatisfied by the government. This was very positive that it happened. I think that the President is frank in his relations with the people and he is really concerned over persisting problems but he does not know how to deal with these problems, as he is still inexperienced… I do not think that this government will be able to improve its performance and I think that we will witness a change of government,” MP Berdzenishvili told Civil Georgia.
