TBILISI, DFWatch–Georgia’s president and prime minister will meet on Monday. The main topic of conversation will be ‘important issues of the country’, according to the president.

The date of their meeting became known on Friday, after Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili said that he and President Mikheil Saakashvili should have met on Friday, but it failed, as the president was abroad.

Saakashvili and Ivanishvili have only had one formal meeting after Saakashvili’s party was defeated in the parliamentary election in October 2012.

In addition, they met unofficially at the jubilee of Patriarch Illia II, but they didn’t speak personally during this meeting.

The two leaders’s uneasy relationship is a reflection of the precarious power-sharing situation the country is in; in diplomat language called ‘cohabitation’.

Recently negotiations between the two power blocs failed, which was about few important issues of the country, including constitution amendment, by which president’s authority will be reduced.

A few days ago, the prime minister sent a letter to the president calling on him to observe his declared position regarding the constitutional amendments in the next 2-3 days. Afterward, Saakashvili said he was ready to meet Ivanishvili, but they didn’t announce a date for the meeting.

At a government session Friday morning, the PM said that Saakashvili refused to meet him because he had to go abroad.


The president’s administration claims that no meeting was planned on Friday. Later, Saakashvili said the same at a meeting with UNM members.

The president said he is ready to meet with Ivanishvili Monday morning, but he also urges him to be serious about the meeting.

“We think on Monday morning we’ll find a way to meet at any place and talk about different subjects. This is our initiative and this should be serious and fruitful meeting. In addition, Georgia’s prime minister has direct phone contact with me and we do not need to play games, Facebook, ultimatums and moreover, insulting conversations,” he said. “We can take the phone calmly, call, arrange, meet, negotiate, while all issues can be solved.”

After his statement, the prime minister’s press office issued a statement saying he is ready to meet Saakashvili Monday morning. But the time and place of the meeting remains unknown.