Georgia: the Caucasus garden between the west recall and the Russian control.

A report by Antonella Valmorbida
Director of the Association of the Local Democracy Agencies.

Georgia is the garden of the Caucasus region and can be called the Rimini of the Soviet Union. The seaside resorts in the Black Sea were the destinations of the Moscow leaders. Long summers and a beautiful sea.
The wonderful Georgian hospitality and the sumptuously tables with plenty of food and drinks are the typical and essential things during the long nights with friends.

During the year 2003, that we remember as “The Rose Revolution”, the day that Mikhail Sakaashvili finished the cup that Schevardnadze loved to put on his presidential table in the Parliament, began the possible independence and democratisation process in the country.
However, this change has been very difficult and now the Georgian population lives in an even worse economic situation. Electric power in the country is in continually risk because it is one of the hinges of the delicate relation with big Russia. The productive system is old, in disuse and, in substance, it is to throw away.
Georgia’s borders and the geopolitical stability are threatened in three fronts. In the North-West, Abkhazia has declared an independent State, recognized only by Russia. As a consequence, more than 200.000 Georgian refugees have poured into the country with few possibilities to return to their home. Abkhazia is under Russian control and it is one of the “latent conflicts” in the area. South Ossetia has the same destiny, not far from the Chechnya border.

In the south, near Turkey, the Adjaria county has kept an agreement with Tbilisi for possible autonomy.

From a political and international point of view, the young government was born with Sakaashvili’s intention to a fast entry into NATO to stabilize the country and to remove it from Russian influence.

The US help Georgia with a lot of money and support especially the big investments in the gas ducts that lead from the Caspian Sea to Turkey and Europe.

The political and administrative system has been recently modified. It gives greater weight to the municipalities and other local territorial subdivisions. The administrative elections have been fixed without warning for next October. For the first time the administrative elections will have to work with the new system. We will see another test of the democracy of the country.
In this way, there is still much to left to do from the structural point of view that cultural.
Peace and development of the Caucasian region and of the neighbouring region (Armenia and Azerbaijan) much depend on the important steps that Georgia has to realize to become a modern democracy.

“ The Local Democracy Agencies in Kutaisi will change the strategy of the Association of the Local Democracy Agencies and it projects our job and the job of our partners in the challenge towards East”, Antonella Valmorbida, Director of the Association of LDA.
“ The project of the Local Democracy Agencies in Kutaisi was born in 2003 when the Association of English Municipalities proposed to us Newport and Bristol as partners with the aim to open an office in Georgia.

We have accepted the challenge in order to verify if the methodology of multilateral decentralised cooperation could be effective in that country. We have studied the situation and the feasibility of the programme for two years. After the construction of the local and international network of the partners and after having found the necessary resources, we were ready to open the Agency in Kutaisi. We are very satisfied”, said Antonella Valmorbida Director of ALDA.

She is the Director of the Association of the Local Democracy Agencies. The Association of LDA is comprised of 11 Agencies in the Balkans and more than 140 members and 150 partners (local and regional authorities and NGO) all over Europe.
The programmes deal with democratisation at the local level and the defence of human and minority rights. The main activities of the new Agency in Kutaisi will refer to these topics; it is the second biggest city of Georgia and it is four hours away from Tbilisi and two hours from the Black Sea.

“ The LDA was opened in this city because we would like to value the partnership between Newport (Wales, UK) and this region. Moreover, there are new forces and for this reason the City of Kutaisi has also signed the partnership. It is an important challenge because our Association opens itself to a new Eastern border.

It means to study, know and invest resources to understand an unknown society and culture.
We will realize this mission with the LDAs in the Balkans and with all our partners.
We hope to achieve the same effects in this country that we have achieved in South East Europe from 1993 when we began to work there” Ms Valmorbida underlined.

Antonella Valmorbida