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By Vicken Cheterian and Tata Makhatadze
MediaChannel.org
TBILISI, Nov 24, 2003 -- With the resignation yesterday of Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze, people power has once again triumphed in the former Soviet Union. At the center of the storm stood Georgia's media.
The most active media outlet in this struggle has been the independent TV news channel Rustavi-2, the bete noire of Georgian authorities. Rustavi-2's tactics were straightforward, but dynamic: live exit polls, reports about election irregularities, extensive air-time for opposition candidates.
And the coverage found its mark. Just over one week after the elections, three pro-government political groups -- the Revival Party, Industrialists Party and Labor Party -- charged that Rustavi-2 was responsible for Georgia's current political crisis and said they would boycott its journalists, according to Reporters Without Borders. The channel's journalists had already been banned from the autonomous province of Ajaria, whose autocratic leader, Aslan Abashidze, had allied himself with Shevardnadze.
Three days later, Georgia's national elections commission canceled Rustavi-2's the accreditation for broadcasting a message from the student movement "Kmara" (Enough) that called on several commission members to stop rigging election ballots, warning them that they would be prosecuted if the irregularities continued.
Little wonder, then, that among the locations opposition leader Mikahil Saakashvili called on supporters to protect was Rustavi-2's headquarters.
But the political crisis that followed elections plagued with irregularities had also shaken government-run television channels. President Shevardnadze criticized reports by state-owned Channel 1 for not presenting the pro-government position.
"One cannot stand simultaneously on both sides [of the barricades]," Shevardnadze said on November 19, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. "One television channel -- at least one -- ought to work for the benefit of the state."
On Sunday, the day of Shevardnadze's resignation, Channel 1 was still playing it safe: historical films were broadcast throughout the morning. Only when opposition groups leveled criticism at the state television channel did live relays of the events unfolding in downtown Tbilisi begin -- albeit, without comments.
But the increased political militancy of Georgia's television channels has alarmed some observers. "We witnessed the transformation of Rustavi-2 into a political party," commented Ia Antadze, a reporter for the independent station Radio Liberty.
"All [non-state] channels tried to maintain the level of pluralism to some extent by giving voice to various forces," said Ghia Nodia, a political commentator, "not managing, though, to hide their personal sympathies for this or that political force."
That was a trend shared by channels on the other side of the political divide, too. The Imedi and Mze television channels, set up a few months before the elections, had a clear pro-governmental style that won the public recognition of then President Shevardnadze, who expressed his preference for them over state-run TV.
That preference held to the very end: Only with the intervention of opposition leader Mikhail Saakashvili did a reporter from independent Rustavi-2 manage to gain access Sunday to final talks at the presidential compound between the opposition and Shevardnadze.
Yet for all the coverage of Georgia's Velvet Revolution, analysis was in short supply. Events seemed to move too quickly.
Still, journalism is the fashion today in Georgia, and for a reason. This year, more students applied to Tbilisi State University to study journalism than any other subject. in a time when the profession's ethics and practices are being questioned in many countries, in Georgia it is seen as at the forefront of the struggle for civic and political liberties.
"If our society moves in any direction," concludes Radio Liberty's Ia Antadze, "the media are one step ahead in that movement."
As Georgia plans for the future, its journalists can only hope that role will continue.
-- Vicken Cheterian is the director of the Caucasus Media Institute (CMI), and Tata Makhatadze is the Georgia Country Representative.
CMI is a media training and research institute operating in Armenia and Georgia. It is supported by the Swiss organization CIMERA. for more information: www.caucasusmedia.org, www.cimera.org
© MediaChannel.org, 2003. All rights reserved.
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