Environment Minister to Run for MP

Zaza Gamtsemlidze, the minister of environmental protection, has been nominated by the ruling party as a majoritarian MP candidate in the Tbilisi’s Vake district, Gigi Ugulava, the mayor of Tbilisi, said on April 16.

Gamtsemlidze, who is a biologist and was a director of the Georgian Botanical Institute, became the minister after the recent cabinet reshuffle this January.

Gamtsemlidze will have to compete in the Vake single-mandate constituency with MP Davit Gamkrelidze, leader of New Rights Party, who was nominated by the nine-party opposition bloc; MP Levan Berdzenishvili of the Republican Party and with Leila Gaprindashvili of the Labor Party.

Gamtsemlidze is a second cabinet member who will be running for the majoritarian MP seat. Petre Tsiskarishvili, the minister of agriculture, is running in the Akhmeta single-mandate constituency in the eastern region of Kakheti.