TBILISI – Like Thursday morning’s joint prayer, on Georgia’s Palm Sunday, April 12, opposition leaders and President Mikheil Saakashvili stood together in prayer at Sameba Church.
But the civility that marked the beginning of anti-government protests on Thursday was gone by Sunday, as 300-400 protesters gathered again on Rustaveli Avenue in front of Parliament at 3 p.m. Opposition leaders said they would announce their plans at 4 p.m.
Though opposition leaders had originally announced the pre-Easter holiday (Georgians are Orthodox, so follow a different calendar) as a break for protesters, plans changed after an attack on a main opposition protest sight in front of Parliament late Saturday night. Opposition leaders say about 50 men, including some members of a city street-cleaning crew, destroyed sound equipment and computers, and threatened some protesters at about 11 p.m.
Government sources deny that any city or state employees had anything to do with they attack, which they say is demonstrated by surveillance camerage footage released by the Ministry of Interior Affairs to the media.
But opposition leaders claim they can see employees from the city street cleaning crew.
“We have our own video material, that some members of demonstrations captured by their mobile phones. In this material we can clearly distinguish the head of the municipal street-cleaning crew, Tariel Khizaneishvili, damaging the equipment,” said the member of Conservative Party Bidzina Gudjabidze.
The incident has inflamed what had been an up-till-now restrained relationship between the two sides. After the incident, Tbilisi’s Mayor Gigi Ugulava offered the organizers of demonstration to clean the place near the Parliament themselves.
“We are ready to give the demonstrators all the necessary equipment they need for cleaning in order to avoid tension,” said Ugulava, “including brooms.”
Saakashvili has characterized the people who are unhappy with him as those who lost work under his democratic reforms.
“People demanding my resignation are mostly unemployed, who have lost their jobs during the democratic reforms held in our country. Their approximate number is 250 000,” he is quoted as saying in Newsweek Magazine today.
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