Who Owned Georgia English.pdf

64IT’S CALLED DEVELOPMENTIn 2002 I moved into an apartment next to the MarjanishviliTheater in the Tbilisi neighborhood of Plekhanov. The stretchbetween my flat and the metro was a wall to wall shanty townof kiosks that sold everything from contraband cigarettes toshoe repair to instant passport photos. People also sold trinkets,books and produce along the sidewalks or from the trunks oftheir jalopies. The locality was a bustling little bazaar. Thenone day in 2004, most all the kiosks disappeared. More soonfollowed, diluting Plekhanov’s chaotic atmosphere, although theneighborhood still retained its Asiatic flavor. But in 2011, thecity began a sudden, massive renovation process along the mainstretch of Agmashenebli. Today, the stretch looks like anothercity entirely.The phenomenal amount of development in Georgia in thepast several years is nothing short of mind blowing. The checklistof accomplishments is impressive: the make-overs of Signahgi,Mestia and Batumi and improvements in Tbilisi, Zugdidi, Telaviand Kutaisi; resurfaced streets and a new highway in-the-making;new airports in Tbilisi, Batumi and Mestia - the list goes on. Theruling party modestly said that the nation was responsible, buteverybody knows that what we see is a result of the work theUnited National Movement put into the county. But what wedon’t see is just how the government was able to produce theseachievements. Much of the improvements we see today has comeat the expense of private owners who have had to relinquish theirproperties in the name of progress. In this regard, the nation hasbeen responsible for these changesThe process of property redistribution started in the ShidaKartli region of Georgia when Irakli Okruashvili was appointedits governor 256 . Although President Saakashvili had promised tostrengthen the inviolability of private property in his pre-election256 „People’s” Market Is Being Sold out. http://www.humanrights.ge/ http://www.humanrights.ge/index.php?a=main&pid=6722&lang=eng Accessed14/11/2012