Illegal funding of Droa opposition party example of lack of transparency of political financing in Georgia - PM

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze on Wednesday said the case of the Droa opposition party, which was “unconstitutionally and illegally” financed by one of the European funds, was an example of the lack of transparency of political funding in Georgia.

The press briefing came after the Georgian Parliament earlier today approved the first reading of the bill on the transparency of foreign influence, which calls for the registration of non-commercial legal entities and media outlets in the country as “pursuing the interests of a foreign power” if they derive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad.

Kobakhidze noted the party's foreign funding “was discovered by chance” after Elene Khoshtaria, the leader of the party, “accidentally mentioned” it in one of her social media posts.

Kobakhidze revealed that the political party Droa had set up a fictitious non-entrepreneurial legal entity, through which funds from a European fund had been transferred for several years without any indication of grant projects.

The donor may not be happy about the transparency of their funds, but we should ensure that citizens, who today don’t have any information from where Franklin Club [domestic NGO], [the civic movement] Shame, or other radical organisations are financed, could know from where an organisation received the money and what did it spend it on”, the PM emphasised.

He stressed that transparency in funding is essential for citizens to distinguish between organisations “serving noble interests” and those “pursuing harmful agendas”, adding “I am sure that a very large part of these funds - 70-80 percent, is spent on good interests [...] But 20-30 percent is spent on harmful ideas”.

The Head of the Government pointed out the importance of adopting the transparency law to protect the society and the sovereignty of Georgia.