The Government is Acting in Accordance with Authoritarian Rule – Koridze on Shovi Tragedy

‘’The fact is that the boy was in the disaster zone, now he is out, and there are photos and videos of how he got out. 13 days have passed since the natural disaster, and the government has been explaining to the public, on one hand, what happened in Shovi by its own version of events, and on the other, convincing the public of how flawlessly they handled the disaster and the following days, while it was still possible to save people. To establish these versions

- The government needed time, to limit media access, and close off the disaster area. We don’t know what kind of works they are doing there now. All this serves their efforts to escape this situation with the least amount of damage.

- Of course, the largest share of responsibility lies on them.

The government is now trying to show that its actions in Shovi on August 3 and 4, and the following days, were spotless, and proactively attacks every conflicting information that appears in the media, tries to stop the flow of information, and aggressively indicates that what it says is true, and everything else is false. That is why Irakli Kobakhidze needed a statement saying that stories of actual people who survived the disaster are unconvincing and fabricated. This is what the August 14 statement of the Minister of Internal Affairs, that the stranded survivors were in a safe place so there was no need for the pilots to take a risk, served. As if the government was in such good control of the situation that it didn’t have to take additional risks, they already saw and controlled the full scale of the natural disaster. They are trying to convince us that what happened there was inevitable and there’s nothing they could have done better.

Today, the main concern of the government is for its conduct to seem convincing and to assume the least amount of blame, amid so many human tragedies.

- Will they achieve this?

- It solely depends on the conscientiousness of society. On how accurately society evaluates these facts, how acute are the critical thinking skills of our citizens. This determines whether the government’s strategic communication vision will prevail. It’s clear that the government has set out against the public and tries to convince it – you know nothing, we did everything right, end of conversation. This is a complete, worked-out model of how an authoritarian rule works. It does so because it does not allow questions, dialogue, differing opinions, or conflicting information. It says that this is the ultimate truth and if you don’t believe it, I will make you believe. This is the government’s approach today. That’s why it is making such unceremonious claims, for example, that it would have been impossible for a child to survive such a disaster or whether it’s worth spending resources on rescuing people stuck in the mud. The government is trying to cover up that it mismanaged the situation.

Whether it can do it depends solely on our society's adequate reaction. If society buys all this and tells the government yes, you did everything correctly and we have no further questions, of course, this would be an immature attitude of our society towards such processes, and in many cases, we suffer for it. Look closely, at the first stage, they hid behind nationwide grief, and on stage two, went on the attack. The new front was opened on August 14 by the Minister of Internal Affairs, the man most responsible of all state officials. During the entire 10 days, the agency, which governs all emergency services, which should be fully involved in fighting the natural disaster, was left without the leadership of the minister.

- Is the statement of Vakhtang Gomelauri convincing you that he could not go to the natural disaster area for 10 days because his father is seriously ill, he was taken to Turkey for treatment, and he tended to him.

- It is unconvincing. More documentation is needed. He should present all the documents before the public. I understand that it concerns very important personal information, father's health, but the public interest is so high, the public should get information about the state of health of his father, as well as the clinic where he was and currently is.

Why was it not possible for him to leave his father at any point during 10 days, or how could he leave him on the 11th day?

The public should receive all government records. How and why did the minister get this leave or vacation and whether the government was fully informed about it. The media and the public should not be satisfied by a phrase muttered in a TV interview, this claim needs more convincing. It was presented in a way for the society to accept it emotionally, well, what could he have done, he was taking care of his father in a hospital. This is a matter of high public interest and the people should get answers.

- Why is the government persistent in asserting that we could not have avoided this tragedy, at least reduce the number of victims? Does the ruling party think that the Shovi tragedy can have a significant impact on its credibility and ratings?

- First and foremost, the reason is the victims. This is what the public pays attention to first of all, then, whether the government did the right things at the right time, and if it did everything as it should have, would it be possible to reduce the casualties or eliminate them altogether.

This is exactly what the government fears the most, these questions and opinions becoming public discussions and showing that the government has led a wrong environmental protection policy for the last decade.

We have many such risk zones in Georgia, the government should have worked on this, installed early warning systems, spent money, invited specialists; in a country with a landscape like ours, citizens should have been better protected.

- Did you catch the part of the statement of the Minister of Internal Affairs, where he said that no matter what equipment we have, we are a nation that lies on the Caucasus range, and natural disasters are a matter of seconds?

- Of course, no one is telling the government to separate the Caucasus Mountains from the country. The Caucasus Mountains are the national treasure and beauty of this country, but this doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t protect your society with preventive measures, as they do in Switzerland, Italy, in mountainous ranges in Europe. Of course, no one can stop natural disasters.

No one is telling the government to stop the mudflow, but when it’s coming, you can detect it a few minutes ahead of time, can’t you?!

How many minutes would it take to evacuate the people? The government is being pressed on these preventive measures, but they are changing the subject to suppress the matters of preventive measures and correct planning and organized work of emergency services. These are the two subjects, where the government failed the test in Shovi, not just in my opinion, but objectively. Now it is trying to raise those topics and cause more stir on those topics in the society, where it has nothing to lose, and moreover, will tire the society.

Today, the public should discuss issues that are relevant and important, but of course, this will deal a great blow to the reputation of the government. So the new stage of the government’s messaging is to itself go on the attack and call into question the facts that undeniably happened. Thank god those other people survived, but let’s now ask, how did they survive? They survived because they knew what to do, because the rescue service had no part in their survival. This is the key question for now.

If the government succeeds in saturating society with these discussions, it will try to disorient the public next time.

What’s the problem with the government admitting that they’ve made a mistake? Maybe they think they are infallible and admitting their mistake today will damage them in future elections. But let’s look at it from another side. When the government is being honest, that might be more acceptable to the public. Now we are faced with the fact that the government is not telling the truth and tries to go on the attack from a different direction and thereby buy more time.

On August 3, in Racha, the mudslide from Buba Mountain almost completely destroyed the Shovi resort. The rescue operation started 3 hours late, and after nightfall, the pilots suspended the rescue efforts because the helicopters could not fly safely at night. So far, 26 bodies have been found and 7 people are still missing. Government officials maintain that avoiding the tragedy was impossible, which independent experts don’t agree with.