British Ambassador gives recommendations to Georgia
By Tea Mariamidze
Wednesday, September 9
The British ambassador to Georgia, Alexandra Hall Hall, believes that “Georgia is developing quite well”. Hall made this statement while delivering speech at International Conference in Tbilisi-Europe's New Geopolitical Landscape, on September 8.
The ambassador noted that Georgia has made great progress, and it is a leader in the region, although she gave certain recommendations which need further development.
Hall named three main challenges, which Georgia is facing: the content of democracy - the values that form the basis of democracy, accountability and civil responsibility.
According to the ambassador, Georgia has made many steps towards democracy and the example of this are the elections, which Hall says were held at a high level, but there are still a lot of shortcomings.
“Personalized leadership, accusations, questions, attacks on rival political forces and former officials cause the degradation of the people and the institutions they represent,” Hall stated.
As for the accountability, the official stressed that during the previous year, many unpleasant incidents took place in Georgia, like throwing eggs on the opposition representatives and tough confrontation between the political parties. The ambassador advised Georgian politicians to be “more careful, because any action is like a test, which can be passed or failed”.
Ambassador Hall also underlined that although Georgia has good systems, legislation or public employees, civil responsibility is still very low.
“Any foreigner who leaves Georgia, speaks how badly Georgians drive and how they pollute everything; it is the lack of personal responsibility,” she stressed.
It should be mentioned that the Tbilisi International Conference- New Geopolitical Landscape of Europe: Security, Economic Opportunities, Freedom and Human Dignity in Frontline Countries was held in Georgia on September 7-8.
The Conference is organized by McCain Institute for International Leadership in Georgia and by Economic Policy Research Center.
The Conference was attended by high-level officials, representatives of the Government and political parties, representatives of political, diplomatic, academic, expert circles and civil society from the USA, Western and Eastern Europe.
