Tbilisi court of appeals upholds guilty verdict against Mtavari Arkhi channel head
Nika Gvaramia took high posts under the United National Movement government. Photo: Imedi TV
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Tbilisi court of appeals of Wednesday upheld the verdict of Tbilisi city court against the head of the Mtavari Arkhi TV channel Nika Gvaramia, keeping him in custody for charges of abuse of power in 2015 and 2019, during his time at the helm of Rustavi 2 channel.
Gvaramia was sentenced to three years and six months in prison for each episode, but will serve a single term based on the principle of halving sentences.
The ruling follows a May verdict by Tbilisi city court, which sentenced the media figure for two separate episodes of the case, one of which had caused “serious losses” to Rustavi 2 through disadvantageous commercial deals and the other related to obtaining property through a corrupt deal.
The charges by the prosecutor’s office had alleged the former head of the channel had caused a loss of ₾6,763,509 ($2,239,572) to the channel in a deal struck with a media company in 2015, before also obtaining a luxury car estimated at €76700 from Porsche Centre Tbilisi in exchange for discounts on ads on the channel in 2019.
Tbilisi city court had handed down a prison sentence to Gvaramia for the 2019 episode, while issuing a fine of ₾50,000 ($16,000) on him over the 2015 events. In its new ruling, the appeals court has used imprisonment as judgement for both cases.
In its verdict, the court of appeals has also upheld previous rulings against Kakhaber Damenia, the former financial director of Rustavi 2, and Zurab Iashvili, the director of Inter Media Plus company involved in the dealings in the case.
Damenia had been found guilty of causing the financial loss to the TV company and fined ₾50,000, while Iashvili, sought for indictment for commercial bribery and forgery, had been acquitted by the court.
The Prosecutor’s Office of Georgia has said it will appeal the Tbilisi City Court’s decision to change the qualification in its sentencing of Nika Gvaramia, the founder of the Mtavari Arkhi channel and former General Director of the Rustavi 2 channel, after the delivery of the verdict on Monday.
Irakli Kobakhidze, the head of the ruling Georgian Dream party, on Wednesday said president Salome Zourabichvili would “insult” her office by pardoning Nika Gvaramia, the imprisoned head of the Mtavari Arkhi TV channel, following calls by opposition politicians for the move.
The United States embassy in Tbilisi on Wednesday reiterated its “deep concern” over the judgement of the Tbilisi court of appeals which upheld the verdict of the Tbilisi city court against Nika Gvaramia, the imprisoned head of the Mtavari Arkhi TV channel, and kept him in imprisonment for charges of having caused damage through commercial deals to Rustavi 2 channel he led in 2015 and 2019.
Mamuka Mdinaradze, the executive secretary of the ruling Georgian Dream party, on Wednesday said the statement by United States embassy lamenting court decision keeping Mtavari Arkhi TV director in imprisonment meant the diplomatic office had “admitted for the first time” the channel was a “party media” for the opposition.
Irakli Kobakhidze, the chair of the ruling Georgian Dream party, on Thursday said the statement by the United States embassy that lamented this week’s court decision keeping Mtavari Arkhi TV director in imprisonment was a “direct interference” in the independence of the country’s judiciary.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili on Tuesday slammed the country’s imprisoned former President Mikheil Saakashvili and the “destructive part” of the domestic opposition for “dirty, anti-state campaign” over his conditions in custody, and also accused the former Defence Minister David Kezerashvili of “unprecedented robbery of European pensioners”, which he said had seen “one billion dollars” defrauded from its victims in a scheme allegedly involving the wanted former official.
Irakli Garibashvili, the Georgian Prime Minister, on Wednesday said the case involving Nika Gvaramia, the imprisoned head of the domestic Mtavari Arkhi channel who was convicted last year for improper commercial deals in 2015 and 2019 during his time at the helm of Rustavi 2 channel, was a matter of domestic courts and not the Government.
Rati Bregadze, the Georgian Justice Minister, on Friday said he saw “no connections” between the pardoning of Nika Gvaramia, the head of the domestic Mtavari Arkhi TV channel, by President Salome Zourabichvili and the country’s efforts to meet the 12 priorities outlined by the European Union last year for granting Georgia its membership candidate status.
Officials of the ruling Georgian Dream party on Friday slammed plans by Nika Gvaramia, the former official under the United National Movement Government and former head of opposition-leaning TV channels, to launch a new political party ahead of general elections in the fall.