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Who Trusts the Court – Manipulation with Surveys

January 18, 2011
Dato Kanchashvili, Maia Metskhvarishvili, netgazeti.ge

The Chairman of the Supreme Court of Georgia claims that in 2010 public confidence towards the judiciary system of Georgia has significantly increased; he verified this statement by using the results of  surveys from international organizations. So what  in fact is written in those survey reports?

The Chairman of the Supreme Court of Georgia Kote Kublashvili spoke about the implemented surveys during the final briefing of 2010 in Tbilisi City Court. He said three international organizations – the UN Development Program (UNDP), the US Agency of International Development (USAID) and DPK Consulting (which assists the USAID in the implementation of the project Court Administration and Management Reform) – carried out the surveys on the judiciary system in 2010.

“The data of those surveys are almost equal. According to the results, 60% of the local population evaluates the activities of the court system positively; 77% of interviewed people admitted that judgments on their cases were fair and impartial,” said Kote Kublashvili at the final briefing of 2010 at the Tbilisi City Court on December 21.

Netgazeti.ge got in touch with the abovementioned international organizations to learn more details about their surveys after they received information completely different from Kublashvili. Reportedly, DPK did not carry out any separate survey within the Georgian judiciary system: in the framework of the USAID funded project, organization IPM carried out the survey under order of the DPK. USAID did not carry out any other separate survey in the courts. UNDP polled the public confidence to the judiciary system and according to their results only 17% of the Georgian population trusts the Georgian court. Consequently, it is unclear what data was used by Kote Kublashvili when stating that 60% of the Georgian population had a positive opinion of the judiciary system.

The data provided by the USAID/DPK Survey?

In the framework of the survey ordered by USAID/DPK, IPM interviewed only those people who had appealed to the court. The polls were carried out in 6 regions of Georgia and 2, 000 people were interviewed in total: among them 39. 9 % (797 persons) were in the judiciary professional consumer segment (prosecutor, investigator, lawyer, expert), 60. 2 % (1, 203 persons) made up the non-professional/consumer segment.

According to the polls, 71. 2% of interviewed people were discontent with the court’s services; 62. 8 % thinks the court is impartial; 77% thinks that competent people are employed at the courts; 69. 5 % think court procedures are operative; 60. 4 % thinks the court is impartial and 63. 2% trusts the court.

The Rule of Law Advance Program Manager at the USAID Caucasian Democracy and Governance Office Rusudan Tabatadze said the survey did not measure the feelings and confidence of the population towards the judiciary system. “The survey aimed to find out the attitude of the court consumers towards the judiciary system. Here is the biggest difference.”

The Data Provided by the UNDP Survey?

The survey of the UNDP aimed to study public confidence towards the judiciary system. In the framework of the UNDP project “Support to the Justice System of Georgia” Institute of Social Research (ISR) carried out the research. In the framework of the research, 2, 800 accidental respondents were interviewed in Tbilisi, Kutaisi, Batumi, Zugdidi, Gori and Telavi.

According to the research, 17% of the interviewed people trusted the Georgian justice system; 49. 1 % partly trusts them; 17% is unlikely to trust and 16. 8% does not trust at all.

According to the same research, only 5, 9 % thinks that the judiciary system is independent from the government. 20. 9 % thinks that judiciary system is mostly free from governmental influence; 42. 8 % thinks that the government partly controls the judiciary system; and 30. 4 % thinks that the court is not independent at all.

27% of the interviewed people think that court personnel do not take bribes.

What Data Was Used By Kote Kublashvili?

The only research, whose findings were used by Kote Kublashvili in his final report, was carried out by the Supreme Court of Georgia itself. In the framework of the research 3, 917 court consumers (lawyers, plaintiffs, defendants, convicted, prosecutor, witness, audience member, others) were interviewed.

The spokesperson of the Supreme Court- Nana Vasadze provided us with the research results. “The research was carried out in May of 2010 by the Supreme Court of Georgia and USAID,” she said and added that “77% of the interviewed people said they trusted the court. 53% of them fully trusted the court and 24% partly trusted the court.”

“This research was carried out on the level of interns,” said Natia Kukuladze, PR Coordinator of the USAID Caucasus Judicial Administrative and Management Reform Project.

Kukuladze added that the research was carried out by the Supreme Court itself and USAID consulted them with the research methodology only.

“We assisted them to prepare the questionnaire. It was only consultations. So, the research was dedicated to inner institution usage rather than to scientific purposes. We cannot measure this survey. We can measure the research results if it is carried out by professionals. But it was a questionnaire of several simple questions which were asked to the court consumers by interns and the results were calculated on an arithmetic level,” said Natia Kukuladze.

“Political Parties and the Judiciary System are Still the Most Corrupted Institutions”

Transparency International published this conclusion as a result of the research carried out in 2010.

The Berlin office of Transparency International published the results of the interviews with 500 people in the framework of the “Global Corruption Barometer 2010”. Company “GORB” carried out the polls from June 15 - June 24, 2010 in Tbilisi. To measure public confidence to the judiciary system citizens had to grant points from 1-5 to the judiciary system.

The executive director of Transparency International Georgia Eka Gigauri said 15. 6 % of respondents evaluated the Georgian judiciary system with point 1, which means “The Court Is Not Corrupted At All”’ 15. 6 % gave 2 points to the court; 20. 8 % - 3 points; 9. 6 % - 4 and 13. 6 % decided that the court is extremely corrupted with 6 points.

Eka Gigauri, executive director of TI-Georgia: “If we compare the results of the polls since 2004 to the results of the 2010 polls, we will see that public confidence in institutions such as the police, army, parliament, political parties, media, church, non-governmental and private sector has increased. However, political parties and the judiciary system are still the most corrupted institutions. http://www.transparency.ge/post/global-corruption-barometer-gcb/%E2%80%9Eglobaluri-koruptsiis-barometri-2010


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