Trial on Nika Gvaramia’s Case Postponed for Prosecutor’s Absence

Salome Chkheidze

Court discussion on the case against Nika Gvaramia, director general of the TV-Company Rustavi 2, is approaching the end. On October 28, the defense side had to make final statement but since the prosecutor did not appear at the trial, the hearing was postponed. According to the information provided by the prosecutor’s office, Prosecutor Revaz Bagashvili is on business-leave; this fact was protested by the defense side. 

On October 28, Tbilisi City Court started substantial discussion of Nika Gvaramia and other co-defendants’ case. The defense side was ready to make final statement but the session was postponed and the judge scheduled next trial on November 12. The lawyers said the prosecutor’s office purposefully tries to prolong the process.

Prosecutor Revaz Bagashvili already made final statement. At the trial on October 21, he summarized the testimonies of the interrogated witnesses.

Prosecutor said in 2012, Telasi Company faced some financial problems and if the state had inspected it, the company would have to pay about 10 million lari to the state budget. So, that time management of the Telasi Company offered 1 million lari to the former minister of energy Aleksandre Khetaguri to resolve problem. In order to laundry the bribe, the sum was to be transferred to the bank account of the Company L&M as a reimbursement for the provided service.

The prosecutor quoted testimonies of those witnesses, whose statements made the agreement between the Telasi and L&M Service doubtful. He said money was paid to the L&M Service only to create legal basis for the bribe. “Head of Analysis and Planning Unit of the Telasi Mariam Kaladze was questioned at the trial who said that if the Company implements non-planned procurement with more than 20 000 lari, the issue shall be discussed by the central body of the Supervisors Council. She added that in July of 2012, the issue of the procurement of the service provided by L&M Service was not discussed at the session; as for the signatures on the protocol, they were made in November to show as if the issue was discussed at the session in July,” the prosecutor noted.

Bagashvili recalled the episodes from the interrogation of Davit Doijashvili, head of Legal Unit at Telasi; Doijashvili said the Telasi representatives were personally interested in signing the agreement with L&M Service and this agreement was falsified. Prosecutor said Doijashvili clarified that when agreement was signed, the L&M Service was not yet registered as a company.

During interrogation, member of the Board of Supervisors of Telasi Temur Chincharauli also spoke about the doubts regarding this company. He said Telasi paid unprecedented sum 500 000 lari to the company that they had never paid consulting service before. It is also noteworthy that only 90% of this money was paid in advance. Chincharauli got suspicious by the fact that L&M Service did not have office and nobody knew about this company before.

“Witness Ketevan Badiashvili confirmed that based on Nika Gvaramia’s instruction she assisted Giorgi Nemsitsveradze to prepare the statute of the company and register the company. Later, according to Gvaramia’s instruction, Badiashvili accompanied Nemsitsveradze to the Bank and withdrew the transferred money from the company’s account. The witness said Gvaramia’s driver took them to the bank to get money and the minister’s security officer also accompanied them. As we see, Nesmitsveradze never acted without instructions, orders or assistance of Nika Gvaramia. If Telasi really needed consulting service, they could hire highly qualified company, which would have been internationally known, and not Giorgi Nemsitsveradze, who was a bailiff at the Supreme Court and did not have relevant knowledge and education to provide consulting service,” prosecutor Bagashvili said.

According to the plaintiff, L&M Service did not provide Telasi, KhramHES 1, KhramHES 2 and Mtkvari Energetics with any service. The purpose of transferring one and half million lari to the bank account of the L&M Service by aforementioned companies was to create legal basis for the bribe,” Prosecutor Bagashvili said in his final statement and added that the money, withdrawn as a result of the search, shall be returned to the state.

Prosecutor’s Office charged Director-General of Rustavi 2 Nika Gvaramia, who occupied positions of Ministry of Justice and Education during previous governments, on December 21, 2012. Nika Gvaramia was accused of accepting bribe, money laundering, assisting in false entrepreneurship and fraud financial calculation. 

According to the investigative unit of the Ministry of Finance, Gvarmia was trustee of Aleksandre Khetaguri, former Minister of Energy and Finance “for the development and implementation of concrete criminal scheme,” as a result of which he had to take 1 million USD as a bribe from the Companies Telasi, KhramHES1, KhramHES2 and Mtkvari Energetics, subordinated companies to the Inter Rao Es. According to the investigation, Gvaramia asked his friend Giorgi Nemsistsveridze to establish Ltd L&M Service and later 1 million USD was transferred to the bank account of this company from the aforementioned companies for the alleged consulting service.

Besides Gvaramia, former Minister of Energy Aleksandre Khetaguri, Giorgi Nemistsveradze, director-general of Telasi Devi Kandelaki and representatives of the Ltd Gutidze, Damenia, Chantladze Solution, former deputy minister of economy Kakha Damenia and Izabela Gutidze are also accused in the same crime. One more defendants – former head of Telasi Company Ashot Manukyan is sought.