Odd couple's exit caps rollercoaster decade for Georgia

To lose two colourful, intriguing and unpredictable leaders might be considered the height of political carelessness, but that is Georgia’s fate as its president and prime minister depart the stage.

Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili and premier Bidzina Ivanishvili leave not arm-in-arm but in opposite directions, united only in mutual loathing, the former heading for possible interrogation by prosecutors, the latter for a seat in the wings, perhaps close enough to prompt his young successor.

Their dual exit caps a tumultuous decade during which Georgia has been transformed from a corruption-riddled and violent ex-Soviet backwater into the west’s main ally in a strategic region where democratic, pro-western states are at a premium.

Rose revolution
In November 2003, Saakashvili led the Rose revolution, a wave of massive protests that replaced Georgia's Soviet-era old guard with a young elite who wanted the country to escape Russian domination and move closer to the US, EU and Nato.

Saakashvili’s early successes were spectacular, as he attacked graft and bureaucracy and set about modernising a country which, since the Soviet days, had grown used to neglect, decay and power cuts.

But as foreign investment surged into Georgia, and relations with the West grew warmer, so Tbilisi’s ties became more strained with Moscow and two separatist regions of Georgia – Abkhazia and South Ossetia – that were propped up by the Kremlin. That deterioration culminated in a 2008 war that was brief but disastrous for Georgia.

Saakashvili denies that he started the war by ordering his forces to retake South Ossetia, but his handling of the conflict seemed to confirm many people’s belief that he was an impetuous character who could not be trusted in a crisis.

That impression was reinforced by Saakashvili’s increasingly rough handling of protesters, political foes and critical media, which left the opposition in disarray. Ivanishvili – the yoga-loving tycoon with the priceless art collection and private zoo – changed all that.

Vast fortune
Ivanishvili says he felt obliged to enter a political world that he loathed, and still loathes, because he was the only person who could topple Saakashvili, whose early reforms he had supported and even bankrolled from the vast fortune he had made in Russian business.

Uniting much of the fractious opposition, Ivanishvili’s Georgian Dream coalition defeated Saakashvili’s party in elections in October 2012, and he became prime minister.

Last month, Ivanishvili’s protege won the race to succeed Saakashvili, who had served a maximum two terms. With many of the old presidential powers now transferred to the premiership, and with his man in the presidential palace, Ivanishvili (57) could now rule as he wished. But he doesn’t want to.

Instead, he has nominated a successor as premier – Irakli Garibashvili (31) – and is preparing to leave politics after the inauguration tomorrow of the new president, Giorgi Margvelashvili (44).

Ivanishvili says he has done enough after only one year in power. With Saakashvili gone and his party out of government, the billionaire insists that Georgia is now a stable country, in safe hands, where he must now concentrate on developing civil society.

"I am not running from responsibility but going into . . . a tougher area where I am needed more," Ivanishvili told The Irish Times this summer.

“I am planning at least 20 more active years, and in that time I want to build a typical European-style society in Georgia.”

More recently, he said the government may seek his advice once he had stepped down, “but it will gradually happen less and less . . . I will not allow myself to ask questions or give orders from the wings.”

Pulling the strings
Saakashvili and his allies refuse to believe that, with one expecting Ivanishvili to act like "Don Corleone" with "a puppet president and prime minister, and with every party weak . . . It is the dream of the 1990s Russian oligarch – to be behind the scenes pulling the strings with no responsibility."

Prospects for Saakashvili (45) are even less clear, but he may face the kind of questioning that has seen dozens of his allies – including former ministers – questioned, charged and convicted over alleged misdeeds while in power.

“Saakashvili is a political corpse,” Ivanishvili said last month. “I think that there are too many questions for Saakashvili to answer and therefore there is a high probability that he will face questioning.”

Ivanishvili added he would not push for his old foe’s arrest, however, revealing that “the Europeans and Americans . . . are giving us friendly advice, which I agree with: that it would not be in the country’s interests if our president goes to jail.”

The new premier and president say they want to reinvigorate Georgia’s economy, boost foreign investment and improve relations with Russia.

Even if they achieve their aims, they will be hard pressed to make a bigger mark than their memorable predecessors.