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History of Arrears

June 10, 2008

Shorena Kakabadze, Kutaisi

“I am not requesting anything special. I just want them to pay our arrears and treat us as human beings. It is shameful to beg for our salaries for such a long time in the country, and at a time when the government is making claims each and every day that unemployment crisis will be eradicated and new jobs will be created. It is unfair, nothing more,” explained Naili Khvadagiani.

Besides Khvadagiani, there are thirty other former employees of the Kutaisi office of the Public Health Center that was under the Georgian Ministry of Healthcare who have since applied to the Human Rights Center in Kutaisi with a request to execute a court decision and to further protect their labor rights.

The argument stems from arrears dating back to 1998-2000. A suit was brought before the Kutaisi City Court in the total amount of 44, 268 GEL. Initiative group of the Imereti Regional Center of the Public Healthcare and Kote Gvetadze, the director, had applied to the court. Employees of the organization had requested that arrears be paid for a period of 17 months.

The suit was based on the contract signed between the Imereti Regional Center of Healthcare and Imereti Regional Fund of Healthcare. The contract obliged the fund to pay the salaries to the employees of the petitioner organization. Reportedly, the defendant side did not carry out its responsibilities.

“According to the resolution # 33 of the Georgian President, dated by February 3 2003, Imereti Regional Fund for Healthcare was liquidated. Since the employees of the center appealed to us we requested the documents about their arrears. Based on received documents the total amount of the arrears does not exceed 10,000 GEL. Thus, having studied the documents it has become unclear how the court had charged the Fund of Public Healthcare with the sum of 44, 268 GEL. The reasonability for paying the balance is not indicated in the court’s verdict,” said Nana Chapidze, lawyer for the Human Rights Center in Kutaisi.

Kote Gvetadze stated “the center was liquidated back in April of 2008. I was the initiator of the suit but now I do not want to execute the court decision.”

As for the difference between current arrears and the outstanding balance, Kote Gvetadze explained: “There are documents which confirm who is responsible. In addition, to those employees who applied to the Human Rights Center, there are some other employees who have not received their salaries as well. However, they have refused to take the money.”

The former employees of the center claims that nobody has refused to take the old salaries. However, part of them is threatened and fearful of requesting payment of the arrears.

The Human Rights Center’s Kutaisi office appealed to the Imereti Regional Execution Bureau. In reply they stated the bureau has not worked on such a case at all. We then applied to the execution department of the Georgian Ministry of Justice and the reply was the same. However, later, Oleg Topuridze, an employee of the Imereti Regional Execution Bureau, contacted us and explained that “only several employees of the Center for Public Healthcare had requested actual execution of the court’s verdict. Besides, the Imereti Regional Fund for Healthcare has since been liquidated. Thus, you (the Human Rights Center) should appeal to the court in order to bring about changes in the court decision.”

There is doubt that the sum the Imereti Regional Fund had to distribute among employees according to the court decision has already been spent. Moreover, Kote Gvetadze, who was the first to bring the suit, now states he does not request the verdict be executed.

This begs the question: if the court verdict has not been executed as yet, and tens of employees have not received their arrears, how could the execution bureau cancel working on the case? The Human Rights Center continues to work on the issue and will present detailed materials in the nearest future.

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