Supreme Court of Georgia

The Supreme Court Reacts on the Statement Made by the Director of JSC “Georgian Steel”

Published: 03/31/2014

On March 21, 2014, the Supreme Court concluded the examination of the civil case without oral hearing. The case concerned a high-profile dispute between the “Georgian Steel” and “Rustavi Steel”.

During the last few days, the director of JSC “Georgian Steel” Ms. Natia Jakeli in various media outlets made the statements containing the insulting and disrespectful phrases towards the court, simply trying to mislead the public instead of informing the public about the legal aspects of the dispute.

According to the letter issued by the JSC “Georgian Steel” in media, there is no mention about the legal content of the decision delivered by the Supreme Court.  The director of “Georgian Steel” applies only overtly populist methods and by the insulting statements towards the court is trying to strengthen her position.

In the statement the director of Joint Stock Company puts under suspicion the qualifications of the judges and the composition of the board, who examined the above civil case. In order to prove her “rightness”, Ms. Natia Jakeli once again underlines that the trial judges, who examined her case, “are specialized in criminal law”.

In order to inform the public, we reaffirm that the Supreme Court judges after they had been approved by the Parliament of Georgia, the Supreme Court Plenum determines the assignment of the judges to the chambers and no one has the right to indicate to the Supreme Court which judge should be to appointed in which chamber. As to the diploma of one of the trial judge are simply a matter of speculation and the court will no longer be involved in the discussion.We can only say that the discussion of the issue of compliance of the diploma has been already finished and only subjective and biased persons may doubt whether the degree of judge is in compliance with the diploma.

The healthy criticism and reasoned opinions on legal issues have always been and will be always acceptable for the Judiciary, but insulting the judge and disrespect towards the court will always have an adequate response from the judicial authorities.