The Police Is Sucking Blood of the Local Government

During the first six months of 2010, 89879 lari and 35 tetri was spent from the Ozurgeti Municipality budget for the police financing. Basically, this money was used for communal fees, mono cards and petrol. 372 cleaning papers were bought for 13000 lari, 676 toilet papers – for 2500 lari and 80 perfumes – for 1200 lari,” – states an expert.

16858 thousand lari and 15 tetri was spent from the 2010 budget on the gas installation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Regional Agency by the Ozurgeti Municipality. The lightning construction of the same office cost 9335 lari and 9 tetri.

According to the official information provided by the Ozurgeti Municipality local government, this money was transferred to “Ozurgeti Gas” account during the first six months of 2010.

As the head of the joint-stock company “Ozurgeti Gas” stated to the “Human Rights Center,” the organizations pay 86 tetri for one cube meter gas, and the population pays 50.5 tetri.

 “Since January 1st, 2010 till July 1st, the police transferred 20 463 lari for consumed 24 646 meter cube gas,” – said Tsintsadze.

 As the assistant of the head of the Ozurgeti Municipality Sakrebulo, Avtandil Meqvabishvili states, the police is financed by Ozurgeti Municipality 2010 own budget income, and according to the law, the Sakrebulo can spend its own income independently and according to their views.

 “Police ensures the public order and safety, the protection of human rights and freedoms. This is why the decision on police financing was made. As for the 2011 budget project, while working on it, we will discuss the recommendations and ideas concerning the police financint,” – said Meqvablishvili.

 The executive director of “The Union of the Democratic Development of Geogia” Levan Khintibidze declares that when the obligation and lawfulness of financing the state structures are discussed, first, it should be determined what kind of competence they have according to the law. Police represents the structure subordinated to the supreme state governance, in this case – the Ministry of Internal Affairs and acts according to the authority established by the law (“Georgian law on the police”). Consequently, all the expenses spent for this aim (including material-technical, labor compensation and etc.) should be financed from the central budget, specifically – the expenditial part of the annual budget of the Ministry of the Internal Affairs.

 According to his statement, the local government is a legal entity of public law that functions in the framework of the “organic law of Georgia on the local government”.  According to this law, the local government has two kinds of authorities – one of its own and delegated one. The own authority of the local government doesn’t include the police financing, as for the delegated authority, central government (including the Ministry of Internal Affairs) should transfer the necessary money to the local government. In other words, the money used for the delegated authority should not be spent from the local municipality budget.

  “The article 32 of the “Georgian law on the Police” in some ways “asks for” the local budget expensed, but this should be implemented through the above mentioned financial delegation. In other words, the police should be financed by the state and not by the local budget. To correct this fault, our organization addressed the Ozurgeti local government with a recommendation and hopefully, this problem will be taken care of in future. We think, that the local government should do its own business, and the police – its own, in their own resources. Besides, the role of the police in the public order and safety of citizens is very important and it should inevitably have proper conditions for performing these functions, but this should not happen on the expenses of other structures,” – says Levan Khintibidze.

He thinks that not only the 90000 lari given to the police from the Ozurgeti 2010 local budget, but even one tetri is an unpurposeful expense.