Georgia’s Constitutional Court elects new chairman

Zaza Tavadze, a judge of the Constitutional Court, was today elected as the new chairperson of the Constitutional Court of Georgia.

Tavadze, 41, was supported by five of eight members of the Constitutional Court Plenum. His only opponent, Georgia’s ex-Secretary of the Security Council Irine Imerlishvili, received the other three votes. 

Typically the chairperson of the Constitutional Court are elected for five years but Tavadze will serve for only three years and seven months has he will have expired his term in Court.

He has been a judge of the Court since June 2010. Court judges are appointed for a maximum term of ten years and must stand down after this period.

The term of previous Constitutional Court chairperson Giorgi Papuashvili and Court judge Konstantine Vardzelashvili expired at the end of September. 

Earlier the President of Georgia named Imerlishvili and his former Parliamentary Secretary Giorgi Kverenchkhiladze as new judges of the Constitutional Court. 

 Judges of the Constitutional Court are appointed for 10 years; a chairman of the Court is elected for five years.  

All three branches of state powers participate in the formation of the Constitutional Court, which is composed of eight judges and a chairperson, on an equal basis:

• 3 members are appointed by the President of Georgia,
• 3 members are elected by the Parliament by not less than three fifths of the 150-seat legislative body.
• 3 members are appointed by the Supreme Court. 

More information about the new Constitutional Court chairperson: 

• In 1999-2000 Zaza Tavadze was an adviser of the Ministry of Justice's  western Imereti Regional Service for local self-governing bodies.
• In 2000-2004 Tavadze was a leading expert on legal issues at the Public Servants Financial and Property Status Bureau of the Ministry of Justice.
• In 2004 he was head of Legal Department of the Ministry of Refugees and Accommodation.
• In 2004-2007 he was deputy chairman of Human Resources Department of the Office of Prosecutor General of Georgia.
• From March 2007 until February 2008 he was chairman of the Human Resources Department of the Office of Prosecutor General of Georgia.
• In 2008-2010 he held the position of Deputy Minister of Justice of Georgia.