A Jarring Relationship

Semi-separatist Ajaria could tip the balance in November’s elections. How, though, is unclear. by Daan van der Schriek 23 October 2003 BATUMI, Georgia--It might not look like it, but the small Black Sea resort of Batumi is a major and constant headache for Georgia’s central authorities--and, with two weeks to go before parliamentary elections, the headache is throbbing even more than usual.

Batumi is the capital of a semi-separatist region of Ajaria, which is led by 65-year-old Aslan Abashidze, scion of an old Ajarian dynasty. He is a man who cares little for federal laws, or indeed to the Georgian constitution. Since Abashidze took control of Ajaria in 1991 under Georgia’s first president, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, he has managed to amass an impressive amount of autonomy for the region--in fact, almost as much as separatist Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Passports are regularly checked when entering Ajaria from the rest of Georgia.

But unlike Abkhazia and South Ossetia, in doing this, Abashidze has avoided war (the existence of a Russian military base near Batumi helps). Conveniently, he has also avoided transferring locally collected taxes to the central budget--or so Tbilisi claims and commentators believe.

Abashidze’s style of government is autocratic. He never “wins” elections with less than 90 percent of the votes, he cannot brook opposition, and he seems intent to continue the dynasty: a 24-year-old son was elected mayor of Batumi last year by an overwhelming 94 percent. It’s easy, therefore, to lay all the blame for tensions between Tbilisi and Batumi at his dictatorial feet.

“There would be no problem,” says Alexander Rondeli, president of the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies, “but for Abashidze.”

Others, however, argue that matters are not quite so simple. “Because of Tbilisi’s unwillingness to define the responsibilities and power of the center and the regions, Abashidze was able to grasp as much power as he could handle,” says Aleko Kupatadze, a junior research fellow at Tbilisi’s Transnational Crime and Corruption Center.

The result is that Abashidze is a force to be reckoned with in Georgia--at least during elections. His tight control of Ajaria means he effectively controls some 10 percent of Georgian voters. This will be of considerable influence in the coming parliamentary elections, which are being contested by a host of parties. It is unlikely that any of the opposition parties (who have failed, by and large, to unite) or the governmental block will gain an outright victory. In this scenario, support provided by Abashidze’s Democratic Revival Party could well tip the balance.

HARMONY OF INTERESTS

The question is, what will Abashidze ask for in return? He seems bent on turning Ajaria into a Free Economic Zone, which would stimulate the region’s economy--and allow him to keep even more control over Ajaria’s revenues.

Judging by his impressive record of using elections to boost his power, he could get what he wants.

During the 1995 presidential elections, Abashidze supported Shevardnadze. The following year, Abashidze’s Revival party won the elections to the Supreme Council of Ajaria with a large margin, allowing him to take full control of the region. It looked like a quid pro quo: Before the election, several parties were represented in the Council. But in the election, the pro-Shevardnadze party barely put up a fight. Since then, Revival has controlled all its seats. It was a remarkable and highly questionable transformation, but one passed over without complaint by Tbilisi.

In parliamentary elections in 1999, Abashidze did go head-to-head with Shevardnadze, but a now-defunct opposition election bloc built around the Democratic Revival party failed to beat Shevardnadze’s Citizen’s Union of Georgia (CUG). For the presidential elections in 2000, he reverted to the tactic he had used so successfully five years earlier.

Initially, Abashidze also ran as a candidate. But after a last-minute visit by Shevardnadze to Batumi--just days before the vote--he withdrew from the race without endorsing the other main opposition candidate, and even without informing the Ajarians that he had quit the battle. As a result, many of the region’s voters still voted for Abashidze, which may have raised the overall turnout but did not endanger Shevardnadze’s victory.

Soon after, Ajaria officially became the Autonomous Republic of Ajaria, effectively turning Georgia into a federation.

However, notwithstanding this fruitful unofficial and unusual cooperation with Shevardnadze, Abashidze claims that Georgia’s president is intent on murdering him, which is the reason why he never sets foot in Tbilisi.

DISHARMONY OF INTERESTS

Shevardnadze has no such qualms about visiting Batumi. He went there again in the fall of 2001, after the CUG had imploded. When the president awarded Abashidze (whom he often criticizes for not paying taxes into the central budget) with the country’s top military order, many analysts believed that he was again seeking the support of Democratic Revival, in an attempt to recreate the parliamentary majority that he had just lost.

If this was his plan, nothing came of it; perhaps because Shevardnadze had failed to act on another promise made during his visit in the run-up to the 2000 elections: to clarify relations between the center and the regions.

“A few years ago the Ministry of Revenues, which no longer exists, almost cut a deal with Abashidze on budget requirements and overall trade relations, but relatives of Shevardnadze cut it short,” says David Datiashvili of the Caucasian Institute for Peace, Democracy and Development.

Shevardnadze’s relatives were, he believes, determined to keep Batumi out of the profitable business of exporting scrap metal. And, by presidential order, Batumi has indeed been cut out of the metal business; everything now goes through Poti, Georgia’s other Black Sea port.

The tensions are, then, not just because of Abashidze’s personality. “The rivalry between businessmen from Tbilisi and Batumi” is another important reason, says Datiashvili.

And because the entrepreneurs from Tbilisi make use of Poti in their dealings, the claim by Jemal Inaishvili, general director of this town’s port, that “the two ports are not rivals to each other” seems contestable.

The result is that, for the time being, relations between region and center remain undefined. Unless the Georgian constitution is changed, it may remain so for a long time. The constitution, which was approved in 1995, prohibits the institution of regional reforms until the status of the separatist regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia are resolved.

“Perhaps Shevardnadze still thought in 1995 that the Abkhaz conflict would be soon over,” says Kupatadze. “But in the meantime, Shevardnadze has been able to appoint all governors and mayors.” (Mayors were first elected in 2002, but the president still appoints the burgomasters of Tbilisi and Poti.)

“Abashidze for a long time wanted to define power between Tbilisi and Ajaria,” he continues, “but Tbilisi didn’t do so. The current system has helped Shevardnadze to strengthen and keep his power.”

The authorities in Tbilisi seem at least partly to blame, then, for the power that Abashidze has grabbed. Abashidze not only swallowed as much sovereignty as he could manage. He has taken complete control of Ajaria,.

“He runs Ajaria like a feudal prince,” says Rondeli.

“Everything is totally controlled by Abashidze and his clique,” Kupatadze agrees.

And there is a princely fortune to be had. With Abkhazia out of bounds, Ajaria has become the prime summer destination for local tourists. And the border with Turkey offers other possibilities, for shuttle trade, smuggling, and bribe-taking.

“Every truck crossing into Georgia at [the border near] Sarpi has to pay $1,000,” says Tevfik Yaprak, the World Bank’s country manager for Georgia. Little of that money, if any at all, ends up in Georgia’s state budget.

HARMONY OR DISSONANCE?

This failure to hand over customs duties was and is a major bone of contention between Tbilisi and Batumi. The central authorities say Ajaria owes tens of millions of lari (a lari is worth roughly $0.50) to the budget. But Abashidze begs to differ.

“Employees at 64 state organizations in Ajaria are paid from the central budget,” he explained on Georgian television in May. “The money we are expected to transfer to Tbilisi is just enough for the needs of these 64 organizations. After we transfer that money, Tbilisi has to send it back to us. As a rule, Tbilisi does not do that, leaving these organizations in Ajaria without pay.”

So better not transfer it at all. Besides, Ajaria may have less money now than before.

“Most income came from selling off old ships,” says Datiashvili. “But that’s over now: there are none left.”

This might be an important reason why Abashidze’s wants to create a Free Economic Zone. This would be formal acceptance of the current reality--that Ajaria keeps all (or as good as all) of its locally collected taxes. It would also imply that Tbilisi’s business clans had struck a deal with Abashidze. And for Abashidze that has huge value: the rise of Poti and the decline of Batumi’s port indicates how Ajaria’s fortunes can be affected by Tbilisi. Abashidze needs some accommodation with Tbilisi to make Batumi truly investor-friendly--and new business is needed, “especially because Poti imports much more than Batumi,” as Datiashvili says.

It is doubtful, however, that Abashidze will be granted a zone--even if he offers pro-Shevardnadze parties Revival’s support in return. It is feared that, by accepting that Ajaria should have a Free Economic zone, the region would alienate itself even more from the rest of Georgia.

While this may not have prevented Shevardnadze from cutting deals with Abashidze in the past, the president has now lost his obedient parliamentary majority--and most parties dislike Abashidze as much as Shevardnadze. The political risk for Shevardnadze probably now outweighs the return.

Quite how much of a risk becomes apparent in how people perceive the zone. For many commentators, Ajaria would become the Georgian equivalent of Hong Kong. Abashidze has made Ajaria very autonomous, but the fear is that, if he would granted his Free Economic Zone, he would soon start, say, conducting his own foreign policy and become--like Hong Kong--a state within a state.

“Such a zone would just be used to steal more,” believes Rondeli.

Many people seem to share Rondeli’s belief that Abashidze would use it to stuff his own pockets. Already, so Rondeli claims, “Abashidze’s power is based on contraband; 75 percent of the profits end up in his own clan. The remainder is divided as the situation requires.”

But not all hold such a negative opinion. “Our experts who analyzed the proposal didn’t see big problems with it,” says Gogi Topadze, leader of the Industry Will Save Georgia party, a center-ground party opposed to Shevardnadze,. “It’s more of a political problem. Abashidze is in opposition to the government. The idea will therefore not be turned into practice.”

History seems to suggest that, come what may, Abashidze will emerge more independent still out of the elections. But how he will maneuver this time is difficult to predict, not least because of his “developing paranoia,” says Datiashvili.

Since his wife died in June, Abashidze, who employs numerous and highly visible black-clad bodyguards, has sacked his entire cabinet (which counted many of his and his wife’s relatives among its members), and “he is more unpredictable than ever,” says Datiashvili.

But two things seems certain at least: that in the 2 November elections, Abashidze’s skillful political maneuvering and unusual relationship with Shevardnadze could cause problems, and that the Democratic Revival party will win suspiciously comfortably in Ajaria. Abashidze has already announced that he will not tolerate international observers in Ajaria during the elections, as there is (he claims) no need for them. Ajaria’s elections will, “as usual,” be democratic anyway.

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