Opposition nominee accuses Gov’t of Lari devaluation
By Mariam Chanishvili
Tuesday, June 28
A representative of the United National Movement (UNM) party and a party list member of the previous ruling team, Roman Gotsiridze, says the government is lying when it says that the recent devaluation of Georgia’s national currency is because of Brexit.
Gotsiridze claims that the current Government has no definite economic policy and creates inaccurate expectations amongst the public when it says that current value of the lari to the dollar is due to the UK voting to leave the European Union.
Gotsiridze noted that the Georgian economy is in a severe situation and it is not growing at the desired rate.
“All the parameters that need to revive the economy are still in a poor condition, and there still is a problem of macroeconomic stability in the whole country,” said Gotsiridze.
Now, one dollar costs 2.29 GEL, when in previous weeks it ranged between 2.16. 2.17.
Roman Gotsiridze mentioned that previously the government stating that the Georgian lari would be equal to 1.8 or 1.9 USD, as the national currency lost almost 20% of its value against the dollar in 2014-2015, but instead the lari continued its devaluation.
Gotsiridze also criticized the National Bank of Georgia (NBG) and said that the NBG was wrong when they relaxed the monetary policy.
“The dollars, hardly purchased at the rate of 2.5, have to be sold, fearing future devaluation. The selling will lead to the temporary reinforcement and later it will turn out that the economic situation is different. The wrong signal leads to the wrong actions,” said Gotsiridze.
The British pound has devaluated by almost 20% after the UK referendum revealed 52% of voters wanted to leave the EU.
According to the Minister of Economics, Dimitry Kumsishvili, the weakening of the EURO led to the devaluation of the national currency. “This is a one-time influence that happened right after Great Britain left the European Union (EU). I also want to call on our citizens to buy and sell the currency when they need it without special expectations,” stated Kumsishvili.
