PM announces new Regional Development and Infrastructure Minister

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili has publicly announced the country’s new Regional Development and Infrastructure Minister as Elguja (Guja) Khokrishvili.

The previous Minister David Narmania resigned today to participate in the June 15 Mayoral elections.

At a special briefing held at the Government Administration today, Garibashvili presented Khokrishvili to other Government members.

The Prime Minister noted Khokrishvili was well educated, had received tertiary education abroad and had scientific and pedagogical work experience.

"Until this time Guja has been working as the head of the Municipal Development Fund (MDF) and the Caucasian Institute Board chairman. We trust Mr. Guja to work in a very challenging field.

"He has remarkable qualifications, diverse education, experience and the ability to successfully lead the Ministry and continue the road that David Narmania has started. Hopefully Guja will become a productive member of our team and a very successful Minister,” Garibashvili said.

Khokrishvili graduated with a Bachelor, Master and Doctorate degrees from the University of Potsdam, Germany, studying in the field of Economics.

Until 2010 he worked in the same University in various roles before he moved to the Free University of Berlin and worked for a year as a project manager. During this time he also worked as a consultant in the Team of Professionals for Programs and Education Development in Vancouver, Canada.

From 2011 he worked as an expert in the "Open Society – Georgia” fund and GOPA Consulting in Germany.

In 2012 he became a lecturer at Georgia’s Ilia State University and an Open Society Fund (OSF) expert.

More recently Khokrishvili worked as the head of MDF and Municipality chairman of the Caucasian Institute for Economic and Social Research.