Welcome everybody!

I would like to express my admiration for the guests of our country and stress that their visit to Georgia is of special importance for me and for our country.

Today we are expecting several presidents to Georgia.

It is a great honor for me to see the people, the fighters for democracy, coming to Georgia from post-Soviet states. Visit of a great philosopher and political thinker Andre Glucksman to Georgia is also a special honor. I am an ardent admirer of his books and articles from my very childhood. Reading such books was very dangerous at that time. I appreciate a lot his innovative thinking and I must note that nowadays he remains one of the greatest European thinkers.

It is a great honor to have the guest like Mr Natan Sharansky here. He is the symbol of fight for freedom, a man who became the main symbol of anti-Soviet movement in 1970-1980. He is a man whose activity coincided with the period when nobody believed in anything. He was a man who had certain ideals which contradicted to the ones that Soviet regime was propagating. I am a devoted reader of his books. His book on democracy gives a classic explanation of why democracy is better than all the other regimes. Once Churchill equivocally said: democracy is the best among all the worse systems. Mr Sharansky in his book proved that democracy is the best system from all the existing systems in the modern world.

Visit of these two persons as well as the presence of all of you here confirms the importance of the Rose Revolution not only for Georgia but for the whole world.

I would not start talking about the Rose Revolution and its consequences. The US Senator John McCain talked about it in his address in detail. What he has said were the words of not only a Georgia's friend but of the most impartial evaluator of Georgia. He was the first to denounce the corrupt regime of President Shevardnadze. He was the very Senator who came to Tbilisi and got into dispute with the foreign observers. He openly expressed his idea about the ongoing events in Georgia and told truth to these people.

They say that the foreign countries were supporting us in the pre-revolution period, but it is not an absolute truth. Many people abroad thought that it was dangerous and implied a threat of violence.

I remember foreign journalists in Tbilisi expecting the acts of violence, shooting and bloodshed every minute.

Many big countries' TV companies did not come to Ukraine because they thought nothing interesting would happen there, elections would be rigged but people would not rise against it. I made a big effort to ensure that journalists would cover the events in Ukraine as a result of which the Georgian journalists were the first to go there.

Development of events in Ukraine was similar to Georgian.

I would like to pay my special respects to the memory of late Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania. I believe that we are the first Soviet country where a Soviet political elite has changed completely. Mr Zhvania deserves all the credits for that. As a result, completely new people came to power who have acknowledged that they are ruling an independent country. When we came to power a stereotype, that we were inexperienced and would start fighting with each other, was created. Most of the authorized diplomats in Tbilisi used to say it. Most of foreign and Georgian press was writing about it. But two years have passed and nothing similar has happened. Every leader stayed on its post and as never before we are united.

The second stereotype was that the country had an inexperienced government which had not a single idea about governance. The first thing we did in the very first months and which was part of our very elaborate plan was to generate money for salaries, increase tax administration, reform the whole bureaucracy, start infrastructure rehabilitation as a basis for an economic development and afterwards institutionalization of the country.

A group of reformers came to power who have obtained experience from successful and failed reforms since 1995.

The third stereotype was that the populists came to power who would do nothing beneficial for the country. However, this stereotype soon disappeared. Let me draw some examples.

When we started reforming energy system, we could collect only seven per cent of the consumed electricity. We declared that those who don't pay electricity bills would not have energy supply. This was the most unpopular statement, I must say.

In September we held MP by elections in Tkibuli [Imereti region], which is one of the poorest regions of Georgia. In pre election period Tkibuli did not have electricity supply at all, because people were not paying the consumed electricity bills. People live in misery there and unemployment rate is very high.

Everybody was telling our candidate that they would vote for him on condition that he provided them with the electricity, otherwise they would vote for the opposition candidate. The opposition was almost celebrating the victory.

Frankly speaking, we were discussing the issue of providing the town with the electricity and somehow decided to supply them with the electricity for some days (many countries' governments use this method quite often). But we did not make this step. Our candidate received approximately 87 per cent of votes.

I would like to say that Zurab Noghaideli was one of those who insisted on following the rules and not changing the chosen path.

In August the Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko paid a visit to Georgia. After signing the Borjomi declaration we were to go to Bakuriani, a well-known mountain resort of Georgia from the Soviet period. People had been planning to block out the road demanding electricity supply. Several world TV companies would have covered this event to show the whole world how "unpopular" the Georgian government was. But this threat did not frighten us. The people did not receive electricity until the consumed electricity bill was paid. Nobody blocked out the rode, hence we went to Bakuriani and enjoyed our stay there.

By the end of this month, collected electricity bills reach 80 per cent. Thus, the collection has increased from 7 per cent to 80 per cent. It means that the Georgian people are much wiser, much more organized and open-minded than the major part of the so-called political elite could have imagined it.

Look at how the police force is treated. One and a half years ago the police force had five per cent confidence rate. Now according to the opinion poll made by the Americans the confidence rate exceeds 75 per cent. Only Scandinavian countries, Sweden and Norway have similar rates, however neither Italy, nor France or Germany had ever had something similar.

What can be the better example of institutionalization than this?

We introduced a new code of practice and said that the citizens are obliged to cooperate with the police.

A stereotype that people are tortured in Georgia persisted, but the reports made by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch maintain that there is not a single fact of a person being tortured. One of our colleagues even joked that the last report made by Amnesty International can enter the Red Book since this organization has never made such a positive report about any country.

People are no longer beaten up in Georgia, but we demand from people to cooperate with the police force and help them to open criminal cases, otherwise the criminals would move freely in the country. Most of the politicians called out that it was legitimizing the so called "reporting".

The so-called serous politicians and some representatives of intelligentsia were voicing it from the Parliament platforms, in the newspapers and through some other means of mass media. One of the representatives of intelligentsia on one of the channels was saying that "the government has legitimized reporting". I heard these words myself the day before yesterday. However, our people took no notice of these words. They know that it is cooperation with the government, which is in their own interest, rather than "reporting".

It means that we also take a responsibility that there are no longer in our neighboring areas drug dealers and criminals who can kill our son, mutilate him or beat him up tomorrow.

The society turned out to be much more prepared, open-minded than many of the civil servants who are talking and discussing this issue.

Therefore, we should be grateful and pay respects first of all to Georgian people rather than to politicians.

A revolutionary leader Nino Burjanadze and the leaders of non-profit organizations, who did their utmost and basically sacrificed themselves, are present here.

We should admire our people, since they showed that they are much more prepared, organized and have fully realized the importance of their own selves than anybody could have ever imagined it.

It is beyond doubt that expectations were too high.

The greatest curse on the Georgian government would have been getting 96 per cent of votes in the elections. It meant that the government could have disappointed huge number of people.

However, it should be mentioned that based on the recently published research the Georgian government enjoys more than 75 confidence rate after two years of being in power. It also means that the Georgian people are very patient and wise.

I would like to say that we would have big challenges ahead of us. But the main thing is that a cultural revolution is taking place in Georgia.

The main thing in Georgia is an unprecedented increase in confidence rate towards institutions rather than the rating of the leaders. The most important is that we have gained trust in the education system, law-enforcement system, tax system and this is our main asset. The trust towards leaders will increase and decrease, leaders will change, ministers and governments will change. The main thing is to preserve a high level of trust towards institutions - this is our key challenge and the key lesson of the Rose Revolution. We have big growth in economy and investments but it is of secondary importance. The main thing, which this generation is creating, is an extremely high level of trust towards institutions. Of course cultural revolution has not finished in this respect.

The main challenge is to instill sense of responsibility in society, civil sector, civil servants and political spectrum. Today many notions are being reevaluated but the main thing that occurred in Georgia is that Georgian society took the ownership of its property into its own hands.

It is not accidental that everybody loves Georgian flag. Two years ago no-one had a Georgian flag at home. Now there is not a single family, especially in the regions, which do not keep the Georgian flag at home, and there are many such families in Tbilisi also.

On different holidays people display the flags themselves, which is an absolutely different from the one that used to take place in soviet times. I remember in my childhood that flags were deliberately distributed to families to display them from their balconies. Today nobody needs to be reminded to do so, they do it by themselves. Today there is not a single child, regardless of ethnicity, who does not know the Georgian national anthem by heart. Two years ago nobody knew the national anthem, including me, any of you or even the former president.

These are just the symptoms and a picture of what has been changed.

People realize that this is their own country. Today in every district and blocks of Tbilisi fellowships are being created, which ask us to give them money from the budget to repair roads and build playgrounds by themselves. They say that they know better for what money should be spent; they will get this money. This is the property of these people, they are the participants of these processes. This is the main cultural change.

Today's government belongs to people rather than to somebody else. These people brought this government to power, this government is created for these people and this government works not only on behalf of these people but with their participation and direct leadership. This government is doing everything for them.

I deem it to be the most important cultural change, which took place in Georgia, despite all those challenges, which are quite many ahead of us.

Thank you very much.

Communications Office
of the President of Georgia