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Joseph Kei Clarified It Was Saakashvili and Kezerashvili’s Plan to Give and then Seize Imedi from Him

November 2, 2012
Businessman Joseph Kei said it was plan of Mikheil Saakashvili and Davit Kezerashvili to initially give TV-Company Imedi to him and then seize it from him. The businessman said in his interview with the newspaper Kviris Kronika.

“When I said that I had merit in the reinforcement of the previous government, I meant TV-Company Imedi and 200 million USD which I brought to Georgia. As for senior governmental officials’ oppression on me, I can name concrete people – Mikheil Saakashvili and former defense minister Davit Kezerashvili. Generally, they had worked out interesting control schemes of serious business and businessman managements,” Kei said and largely spoke how TV-Company Imedi appeared under management of Giorgi Arveladze.

“After famous events of November, 2007 relation between Badri Patarkatsishvili and government deteriorated. The government demanded Badri to give TV-Company in exchange of dropped criminal liability against him and integrity of his business. It was important for the government to formally and factually accumulate this asset in the hands of a person, who will have something to lose or will be a member of their clan. They offered Sharangia’s candidature to Badri but he declined. I turned up acceptable for both parties. Why Badri accepted my candidature it is personal affair of his and mine. For the government I was a person who had already much to lose in Georgia. The negotiations were going on intensively. Both parties were in hurry; we agreed almost on everything. I met the president and he gave me the guarantee of security of Badri, my business and family members. On my side, I agreed to run the news room of the TV-Company during 5 years. Before documents were prepared and the decision acquired official character, I left Georgia and returned to one of my developers Fisher Ireland in the USA. Several months later Badri died. I was told although Badri died, his family, you and your business are alive and I had to finish the job. I do not want to speak about the issues we discussed then. It is the truth which will be cleared up earlier or later. I finished this deal. Afterwards everything went upside down: I was caught in double fire – Georgian government extremely tensed relation between me and Badri’s family,” the businessman said.

He added that the government created an odious person of him for the society.

“In 2009 I was told: Saakashvili decided to seize Imedi from me; the motive was the following – Ina Gudavadze fights against you everywhere, discredits you and maybe she will seize the TV-Company too. So, we must have the company in safe hands. I was against it because it was not our agreement; I had to return the TV-Company Imedi back five years later. They managed to realize their plans,” Kei clarified.

News agency Pirveli 

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