Political Revenge, or Yet Another Criminal Assault?

Political Revenge, or Yet Another Criminal Assault?

The investigation of criminal attacks on representatives of an opposition Conservative Party is being delayed for some unknown reasons. Among these cases is an attack that took place a week ago on Member of Parliament Kakha Kukava, and the incident gives rise to suspicions among the opposition circles, who speculate on political revenge.

On 16 May at 11 o’clock, two unknown men attacked MP Kakha Kukava and beat him up. After the physical abuse, the attackers took away his mobile phone and his wallet. The attackers were waiting for the MP on the fourth floor of the house in which the MP lives. The Tbilisi Vake-Saburtalo District Court started a case against the abusers on the Article of theft, which greatly surprised Kakha Kukava and his fellow party members, since, according to them, the case should have focused on assault and robbery.

The MP calls the police activity in regards to his case as very passive. However, due to the reality of the lack of resources available to the police unit, the opposition party leader Kakha Kukava doubts that the case will be investigated and opened by the regional police. Further, in spite of the fact that the Parliament gave a special task to the Minister of Internal Affairs to investigate the issue, no one got in touch with the victim from the Ministry of Internal Affairs or from the City Administration. Finding the criminals should not be difficult for the police, since, according to Kakha Kukava, the criminal group is active in his area and if the police organized a raid they would easily catch them.

“I think that the Interior Ministry is simply not interested in opening the case,” said Kukava.  “Now we are simply checking on the different versions of this case through our own means and we have certain information that some of these groups are supported by the government.  As for the political revenge and scare tactics, I do not think that was the case, although I cannot rule it out. But as time goes on these suspicions get stronger, since the government tries really hard to qualify this attack as an ordinary criminal act, and on top of that does not try to properly investigate the matter”. The Conservative Party leader added that despite the task given by the Head of Parliament, the Interior Ministry is not still involved in the matter.

As the opposition party representatives say, they hope that this assault will be investigated and criminals will be punished, since there have already been attacks on the Conservative Party which still have not been investigated, among them the attack and robbery of the Party’s Tbilisi office and also the assault on a party members, Guga Tsanava, in Zugdidi.

Nino Bestavashvili