TBILISI (Georgia): Georgians looking to the TV for information on the country’s worst political crisis in years are out of the luck these days. They’ll find soap operas and comedies but no independent news programs.
Four days after being put into place following clashes between police and demonstrators, President Mikhail Saakashvili’s ban on news broadcasts has deprived most Georgians of their primary source of news about the unrest.
The decision to pull the plug has also deprived the opposition of a platform before presidential elections and raised questions about Saakashvili’s commitment to democracy.
Saakashvili — a pro-Western leader whose own rise to power was fueled by independent media — ordered a 15-day state of emergency to defuse a standoff with the opposition. Government troops had used tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon to disperse thousands of protesters.
The measure banned all news reports except on public television and radio.
The government sent riot police to shut down the country’s most popular station, Imedi, as well as a smaller channel, Kavkasia. Both had aired coverage critical of the government. Employees at both stations were beaten.
On Saturday, both channels were off the air; other stations, including the pro-government Rustavi-2, broadcast both mostly homegrown entertainment programs.
Some opposition newspapers could be seen in the capital on Saturday, but most have small circulations.
The use of force and the news ban prompted harsh criticism in the West. The United States and Europe’s top security body sent envoys to Georgia to urge Saakashvili to lift the ban and ensure a free vote.
Western diplomats have warned that such actions may bode ill for efforts to win Nato and European Union membership for this small Caucasus nation.
Though Saakashvili has been praised as one of the few post-Soviet leaders to champion democracy and freedom of speech, many Georgians say the media under Saakashvili are less free than under his predecessor, Eduard Sheverdnadze.
Rustavi 2, whose critical coverage of Shevardnadze’s government helped fuel the 2003 Rose Revolution protests that ushered Saakashvili to power, has turned largely loyal to the government.
On Saturday, Rustavi 2 aired home decoration shows and comedy series in place of hourly news programs. Only a handful of its 150 reporters, cameramen and producers were working in the usually crowded newsroom in Tbilisi. Computers and cameras had been turned off, offices were deserted, and the anchor’s chair sat empty.
News editor Levan Pitsadze defended the ban as necessary to prevent the country from sliding into chaos. He said the station’s news programs would be back on the air as soon as the moratorium is lifted. Some of his colleagues disagreed.
“They created an information vacuum so that the population would not receive any information,” said cameraman Kakha Sanodze.
Imedia, recently sold by Georgian tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., suffered worse.
Lewis Robertson, an American who is the channel’s director, said troops stormed in three hours before Saakashvili announced the state of emergency.
Much of the station’s equipment was destroyed and employees were tear gassed and shot with rubber bullets, he said. A woman who was nine months pregnant was forced to lie on the floor with a gun pointed at her head, he said.
“It was brutal, and there was no reason for it,” Robertson said. “Right now the country is getting information from one channel and one channel only —that’s not democracy, that’s not freedom of speech, freedom of the press.”
He predicted it could take several months to repair the equipment and get the station back on the air.
On Saturday, Imedi’s office remained cordoned off by police; an AP reporter and photographer were prevented from approaching the building.
“We’re shocked and horrified that, in what was allegedly a democratic country, something like this could happen ... that, effectively, stations are put off the air,” Murdoch said in an interview.
Many Georgians were stunned by Saakashvili’s use of force and his decision to freeze news broadcasts.—AP
