Georgia: Media Reports On Ivanishvili’s Possible Picks For Cabinet Posts
By Civil.Ge
(Civil.Ge) — Bidzina Ivanishvili, whose Georgian Dream coalition won majority in the Parliament, will name his cabinet members at 11am local time on October 8.
Before the formal announcement, media sources started reporting late on Sunday evening about Ivanishvili’s possible picks for several ministerial posts.
A weekly program on Maestro TV, Report of the Week, said late on October 7 that Ivanishvili’s right-hand man and elected MP from the Georgian Dream’s party-list, Irakli Garibashvili would be named as Interior Minister.
Garibashvili, 30, has been working with Ivanishvili since 2005 and headed the billionaire’s charitable foundation Cartu before going into politics together with Ivanishvili late last year.
The same media source also reported that one of Georgian Dream leader, Irakli Alasania, chairman of Our Georgia-Free Democrats (OGFD) party, would be named for Defense Minister’s post.
According to the same report, Ivanishvili plans to name another senior figure from OGFD, Tea Tsulukiani, as Justice Minister. Tsulukiani, 37, was elected as MP from Tbilisi’s Nadzaladevi single-mandate constituency in the October 1 elections; she worked as a lawyer at the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights since 2000 before joining OGFD in early 2010.
Ivanishvili’s picks for some other ministerial posts, according to this report, will be: Georgian Dream’s spokesperson and Georgia’s former ambassador to the Netherlands, Maia Panjikidze – Foreign Minister; ex-footballer Kakha Kaladze, who led Georgian Dream’s party list of MP candidates – Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development; Sozar Subari, who was public defender in 2004-2009 – minister for the penitentiary system; Maia Miminoshvili – Minister of Education; write Guram Odisharia – Minister of Culture.
According to the same report Ivanishvili plans to name Amiran Gamkrelidze as the Minister of Healthcare; he held this post from late 2001 till January, 2004; Davit Kirvalidze, who was Agriculture Minister in early 2000s, will be named for the same post, according to this report.
