Georgia's general prosecutor to launch investigation on presidential donations

The service monitoring the finances of politial parties has announced that Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili's National Movement received illegal donations on a large scale during the election campaign. The agency submitted a report to the general prosecutor's office for further investigation.

A special statement on the matter was made on Thursday by the acting head of the financial monitoring service Zurab Aznaurashvili.

"As a result of the examination of materials received from the general prosecutor's office, the financial monitoring service has revealed that the National Movement had used the funds provided for employment programs for party purposes in violation of the law and received illegal donations worth 5.240 million lari ($ 1 = 1.65 lari). In particular, in 2012, the social service agency registered labor agreements with 21,837 persons within the employment program, who held a pre-election campaign in favor of the party. This proves that there was disregard for the purposes of the employment program, and the funds provided for its implementation were used in favor of the National Movement's election campaign", Aznaurashvili said.

According to him, in accordance with the decision on amnesty taken by parliament on December 19, 2012, the agency has no right to carry out administrative proceedings. Since the case involves law violations, the report will be forwarded to the prosecutor for further investigation.


/Trend/