Georgia’s disputed Parliament approved two members – Gia Murghulia and Davit Kartvelishvili – to the Board of Trustees of the Georgian Public Broadcaster (GPB) on June 23, while one opposition-designated seat remained vacant after none of the opposition nominees secured enough votes.
Incumbent member Gia Murgulia, nominated by the ruling Georgian Dream faction, was re-elected to a second term, while Davit Kartvelishvili, a member of People’s Power, a ruling party’s offshoot, was elected after being nominated by his party.
Murgulia, 71, is a Georgian philologist who has been serving as Deputy Chair of the GPB Board of Trustees under Vasil Maghlaperidze. Kartvelishvili, a pro-government political commentator, joined the People’s Power party in October 2022.
None of the three candidates nominated by former Prime Minister Giorgi Gakharia’s For Georgia faction – Teona Gegelia, Eliso Gabadadze, and Teimuraz Kekelidze – received the required 76 votes for election.
According to Georgian Dream Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili, the For Georgia faction will be entitled to nominate a single candidate for the remaining vacant seat from July 1, after which the legislature will vote on the nomination.
The GPB Board of Trustees consists of eleven members serving six-year terms: three nominated by the parliamentary majority, three by the opposition, two by the Public Defender, and three by the Supreme Council of the Adjara Autonomous Republic.
According to MediaChecker, an independent media watchdog, the procedure for appointing GPB trustees will change starting July 1. Under parliament-adopted amendments, candidates will no longer be selected through an open competition, and the selection commission responsible for vetting candidates will be abolished. Instead, the entity holding the relevant nomination quota will directly nominate a single candidate to Parliament for each vacant seat. Parliament’s Committee on Economic Policy will then review whether the nominee meets the legal eligibility requirements before the nomination is put to a vote.
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