Head of Kakheti Office of the Environmental Office: “I Do Not Care What Citizens Are Complaining About”

Gela Mtivlishvili, Kakheti

Head of Kakheti office of the Environmental Police Irakli Doborjginidze said he executes the orders of the government and does not care what citizens are complaining about with the human rights organizations. “I execute state orders and do not care what people are complaining about,” said Doborjginidze.

Socially disabled Liza Sarikashvili blames the inspectors of the Kakheti office of the Environmental Police for imposing illegal fines on her; she is requesting to cancel the fines.

“At 7:00 pm, on September 29, 2010 I removed dry leaves from the plant in front of Nino Natsvlishvili’s shop at the central motorway in Chandari village in Gurjaani district. I put them in the polyethylene bag and left them at the corner of the building; the rubbish car was supposed to collect it on the next morning. I was working as a shop-assistant at the shop. Before closing the shop two people entered and introduced themselves as inspectors of the EP. However, they did not tell me their names. I explained to them that the rubbish car was running in the village once per week on Thursdays and villagers put rubbish bags in front of their houses on Wednesday evenings. The car comes early at 8:00 am so I prepared the rubbish bag for the morning. They drew up a protocol but did not read it to me. The young men explained I would not be charged  anything at all; they simply made a note about the situation in the village. On November 3, 2010 I was called on the phone and informed that next day – on November 4, the protocol was to be discussed. I attended the discussion the next day where I clarified that I had not breached the law. Nevertheless, on November 29, 2010 I received a resolution # 21376 about an administrative fee which stated that in accordance with Article 146 Part I of the Administrative Code of Georgia, 200 GEL was imposed on me and reimbursement of the damage to the state 16, 13 GEL,” Liza Sarkisashvili said.

The socially disabled citizen appealed against the fine with the Minister of the Environment, but the Ministry sent her appeal back to the Kakheti office of the Environmental Police which did not satisfy her appeal. Their judgment does not indicate the place and deadline to appeal against the decision.

Lawyer of the Human Rights Center Lia Khuroshvili, who studied Liza Sarkisashvili’s case, said that inspectors of the Kakheti office of the Environmental Inspection illegally drew up an administrative protocol on Sarkisashvili.

“Disposition of  Article 146 of the Administrative Code of Georgia states that a person shall be fined if “she/he puts construction and domestic rubbish, spoilt constructions, materials, subjects on the ground or rocky layers, in the rivers, lakes and on their shores, on the splays and in the ravines, in the parks, gardens, squares, yards, sport grounds, auto-parking areas, near market places or in other places; as well if she/he violates the scavenge and cleaning rules.” The action of Liza Sarkisashvili cannot be qualified in accordance with any of the abovementioned regulations. The dry leaves are not domestic rubbish. She did not throw the leaves in the street or elsewhere.  Just the opposite; she put the bag in the place where the rubbish cart had to collect it. Witnesses also confirm this fact. Villagers put the bags in the street from where the rubbish car has to collect them on the next morning. There are no other rules regarding trash and other refuse in the village. The notification released by the cleaning service center proves it,” said the lawyer.

The lawyer added that “Article 264 of the Administrative Code was breached; more precisely, the Kakheti office of the Environmental Inspection did not estimate the damage caused by Sarkisashvili to the state and it is not clear how 16 GEL was calculated.”

According to the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources the amount of fines imposed for the last four months have exceeded 400 000 GEL. According to the Ministry, more than 12 000 facts of violation were observed throughout the country and mostly individual persons were fined for the violation.