Georgien: Tod des Beschützers

Nach dem Tod von Premierminister Surab Schwania muss die georgische
Politik erwachsen werden, sagt Jaba
Devdariani in einem Artikel von Transitions
Online.

As the initial shock at Zurab Zhvania’s unexpected death passes,
both politicians and analysts are coming to realize a somewhat
uncomfortable truth: that Zhvania, though aged only 41, was a
guardian of Georgia’s volatile political system. Almost nobody
liked him, but most people implicitly relied on his sober
judgment. 

For the past decade and a half, independent Georgia’s political
system has worked like a shredder, destroying the country’s
political elites with menacing regularity. The emergence of Zviad
Gamsakhurdia as president in 1990 all but obliterated the communist
elite. Gamsakhurdia was himself toppled by his former allies from
the pro-independence national movement just nine months into his
presidency, in early 1991. His allies were hunted down: many were
killed or forced into exile in a confrontation that simmered until
1995. Eduard Shevardnadze attempted to set things straight in
Georgia. Surrounded by warlords and aware that the communist elite
that he himself exemplified could not be resurrected, he allowed
the intake of a fresh and young cadre into his fledging party, the
Citizens’ Union of Georgia (CUG). The shredder slowed down for a
time, but the demise of the CUG and the subsequent resignation of
Shevardnadze in 2003’s Rose Revolution eased many pro-government
activists out of political life.

Through all these upheavals, Zurab Zhvania managed not only to
stay on, but to grow consistently as a person and as a politician.
He started off as the Green Movement’s activist in the independence
movement of the late 1980s, escaped the controversy of
Gamsakhurdia’s presidency and civil war, and re-emerged in 1993 as
a surprise candidate to chair Shevardnadze’s CUG. He went on to
become a reformist chairman of parliament and the embodiment of
Georgia’s young, westward-looking political cadre for most of the
1990s. So when this survivor gave up his seat as parliamentary
chairman in 2001, it was a clear sign that Shevardnadze’s rump CUG
would die. 

His veteran status in Georgia’s politics also meant the breadth
and depth of his contacts in Georgian society and abroad was
unmatched. With all of that, Zhvania still managed largely to avoid
accusations of bribery and corruption–and that in the wildly
corrupt Shevardnadze administration.

One of Zhvania’s most valuable and rare talents was his ability
to create a politically favorable environment for those things that
he considered valuable: the development of independent media, the
growth of Georgia’s civil society organizations, and accession to
the Council of Europe. He may have conceded the leadership of
Georgia’s democratic revolution to Mikheil Saakashvili, but he was
essential in creating the preconditions for it and for making it
happen. 

He was, in short, an architect and protector of Georgia’s
progress. In an article commemorating Zhvania, Nodar Ladaria, a
columnist for Georgia’s liberal weekly 24 Hours and a
scathing critic of the inconsistency with which the Saakashvili
administration has pursued democratic reforms and liberal policies,
managed to capture the essence of Zhvania’s role, as many Georgians
saw it, and the feeling it elicited in them. “I realize now,”
Ladaria wrote on 7 February, “that the fact of Zurab Zhvania’s
existence allowed me to dress up my criticisms in a light, even
playful form of parody. Somewhere, deep down, I always felt that
the increased grotesqueness of some of our political ruling class
would pass through the filter of Zhvania and, thus, would not leave
a lasting scar on our country.

To read the full text of the article, visit the Transitions Online website.