When privatizing prestigious real estate property or state-owned companies, the Georgian government has often designed specific conditions that the successful bidder had to comply with. These conditions go beyond the requirement for a one-time payme

As of today, the registration of land plots in Mestia presents a considerable challenge. Land plots have in fact never been legally registered in the high mountainous regions of Georgia, such as Svaneti. Traditionally, the local population has owned

The Ministry of Economy and Sustainable Development has disclosed that the company Golden Com is the winning bidder for the 4-year management rights of Alpha-Com, the state-owned entity that manages all of Georgia's broadcasting stations that transmi

This post was updated on August 1, 2011 The Ministry of Economy and Sustainable Development is auctioning off the management rights of LLC Alfa-Com for the next four years. Alfa-Com is a fully state owned entity with about 330 employees that operates

In a new wave of evictions, internally displaced persons (IDPs) were forced to vacate four temporary shelters in Tbilisi on July 18, following previous rounds of evictions in August 2010 and January 2011. A majority of these IDPs were old caseload f

In an earlier blog post, we raised concerns about the systematic practice of 'ghost voting' within the Georgian Parliament. Our report quickly caught the media’s attention and prompted several TV reports and news articles, in one of which an MP who w

Throughout much of Eastern Europe, lustration laws have been enacted to strengthen national security and prevent ex-Soviet operatives and informants from holding public posts. The Georgian Parliament has recently followed the trend, drafting and pass

On June 13, 2011 ruling party MPs Pavle Kublashvili, Akaki Minashvili, Chiora Taktakishvili and Koka Anjaparidze initiated amendment to the law on assembly and manifestations . According to the explanatory note, the purpose of the amendments is to

The recent agreement between the ruling party and several opposition parties on election system changes includes, among other things, raising the number of MPs from the current 150 to 190. This would of course require constitutional changes which the

One of the basic principles of representative democracy is that legislators must cast their own votes. This ensures that they can be held accountable to their constituents during elections for their stance on new legislation. The Rules of Procedur