Pro-government TV Owner Says Euro-Atlantic Aspirations Should Not be Included in Constitution
In his July 11 interview with TV programme “Imedis Kvira,” aired July 14 on the main pro-government Imedi TV channel, its owner Irakli Rukhadze criticized the inclusion of Georgia’s European integration aspirations in the Constitution. He said: “Why is this [Art. 78 of the Constitution on EU and NATO integration] written in the Constitution? It’s complete nonsense, if you ask me. We shouldn’t have put it there…”
The Article 78 in the transitional provisions of the Constitution of Georgia adopted in 2017 stipulates that “the constitutional bodies shall take all available measures within their competence to ensure Georgia’s full integration into the European Union and the North-Atlantic Treaty Organization.”
He also downgraded the importance that Georgian citizens attach to the European integration. “They say that 80 percent of the population of Georgia wants to join the European Union. That’s probably true, but… in the same NDI surveys that these numbers came from, when they ask about important issues, only 2 percent think… it’s [the Euro-Atlantic integration] on the list of important issues.”
He claimed that issues such as eradicating poverty, healthcare, education, employment, territorial integrity are more important for Georgians.
Irakli Rukhadze has a history of being a business partner of the ruling Georgian Dream party founder Bidzina Ivanishvili. In 2021, Media Finance Group B.V., co-owned by Rukhadze, bought the company LLC Georgian Media Group, which owns TV Imedi from Ina Gudavadze. Gudavadze is the wife of the late tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili, who had founded TV Imedi in 2003.
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