Protest of Laituri Residents in Ozurgeti

Nino Mshvidobadze, Guria

On January 30, at 11 am, about 200 citizens gathered in the square in front of the Ozurgeti theatre; the protest assembly was organized by the local leader of the Labor Party Davit Mamaladze, who said it was peaceful, non-political warning demonstration to attract attention of the local authority.

Protesters were residents of Laituri town in Ozurgeti district. They requested return of the plots, which were illegally sold by previous government. Human Rights Center found out that Laituri residents protested unfairly sold plots during privatization process. “Although we held several protest demonstrations with regard to illegal sale of our plots, governments did not reply to us. Part of tea plantations (940 hectares) located in Laituri and another 640 hectares of land were sold to two persons. Buildings, tea factories and auto-tractor garage were also sold. Then, the purchasers abandoned the plantations and the government, instead punishing investors for that, registered plots on them. Afterwards, the owners sold the plots to new investors. Now they claim procedures were done legally. We demand restoration of justice and our plots back,” the organizer of the assembly told humanrights.ge.

Protesters went to district administration building, where they met Guria region governor Giorgi Chkhaidze and Ozurgeti district governor Kote Sharashenidze. 

Levan Dumbadze from Laituri said district interim governor Konstantine Sharashenidze had been in a family of their neighbor last night and categorically demanded them to stop villagers’ protest. Dumbadze claimed the governor tried to oppress the family. 

The district governor clarified: “Deputy regional governor and I arrived in Laituri and talked with locals; we wanted to meet local population together with the representatives of competent institutions; so we could resolve this problem.” The interim governor added he had discussed the issue with lawyers. “We will definitely find out how much money the company representatives will request in exchange of those plots. We are also concerned with this problem; we will travel to the place together with special commission and resolve it together. I offer you good action plan.”

Davit Mamaladze: “In terms of law, we are in bad situation because plots have owners now and the state distributed them among private investors. The main problem is that investors pay taxes to the state budget but they do not cultivate land whilst villagers have very low income and travel to neighboring countries to earn their living. In parallel to that plots in their native villages are not cultivated and abandoned. We know the new government is not guilty in it but before this fact acquires political motives, we should help population to resolve the problem.”

Giorgi Chkhaidze, Guria regional governor: “We fully understand problems of these people but it happened in 1990s and legally their cases are already too old to discuss. We organized meeting with regard to this topic, we study their problem, prosecutor’s office also launched case and we are waiting for their conclusion.” 

According to the Human Rights Center’s information, a commission will be established which will travel to Laituri and study legality of the protester’s allegations.