Organization the “Young Barristers” presented the monitoring results of handing one million GEL received on a charity dinner to families of 2008 August war victims.
According to statements of co-founder and chief-executive of the “Young Barristers” – Archil Kaikatsishvili, confirmation of handing 1.5 million GEL to the IDPs on July 2011 has not been verified yet. After interviewing various displaced persons, the judicial group of the organization was answered that none of them received the publicly promised money.
The monitoring results do not confirm official position of organizer and host of the charity dinner – the Business association of Georgia, according to which, they created a full list of August war victim families. 400 families included in the list were entitled to receive up to 2500 GEL. The following ministries did not verify cooperation with the Business Association of Georgia and the charity dinner: Ministry of internally displaced persons from the occupied territories, accommodation and refugees of Georgia, Minisry of Defence, Ministry of Internal Affairs, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Corrections.
During the monitoring process “Young Barristers” held communication with Business Association of Georgia which claims that government authorities were the ones giving contact information of the August war victim families, the event was funded by money received on charity dinner and one million GEL was equally distributed over the families that lost a member in war. The organization considers the distribution process, which should have given one million Lari equally to four hundred families, as non-transparent. So, it is unclear how many families received the aid in real, what was the amount of money given to those families, who was the responsible person of this process for being transparent and why are the evaluations made by Ministries of Georgia and Business Association not corresponding to each other.
According to evaluations of the “Young Barristers”, there is a reasonable assumption, that the charity dinner was an activity of Government of Georgia instead of an initiative of Business Association of Georgia and funds received were used for organizational purposes of the evening and interests of the political party.
Due to high interest in the issue, in frames of monitoring, the “Young Barristers” addresses Business Association of Georgia with a recommendation and demands explanations on following inssues:
- The association must reveal the purpose of disposing and aim of more than 1 million GEL received at the charity dinner.
- The association must present factual proofs indicating that money received at the charity dinner was distributed to more than 400 families of 2008 August war between Russia and Georgia
- The association must publish geographical area and the selection rule of the war victim families.
- The association must explain different positions of ministries and the association in terms of cooperation
The “Young Barristers” offers public explanations to the Business Association of Georgia on their web-site until May 7th 2014. The organization does not exclude to appeal to control authorities in order to reach a legal reaction on the issue.
