Giorgi "Gigi" Ugulava ( ka, გიგი უგულავა) (born August 15, 1975) is a Georgian politician and the former

Mayor of Tbilisi The Mayor of Tbilisi is an elected politician in Tbilisi. Before 2005 the mayors used to be appointed by the central government. In 2006 first mayoral elections were held in the history of the Republic of Georgia. The first elected mayor of Tbilis ...

(2005–2013). He was one of the former leaders of the United National Movement (UNM) party and former close ally of the former

president of Georgia The president of Georgia ( ka, საქართველოს პრეზიდენტი, tr) is the ceremonial head of state of Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus * Georgia (U ...

Mikheil Saakashvili Mikheil "Misha" Saakashvili (born 21 December 1967) is a Georgian and Ukrainian politician and jurist. He was the third president of Georgia for two consecutive terms from 25 January 2004 to 17 November 2013. He is the founder and former chair ...

. On 10 February 2020, he was sentenced to 3 years in prison . However, on May 15, President

Salome Zourabichvili Salomé Nino Zourabichvili (born 18March 1952) is a French-born Georgian politician, former diplomat, and the fifth president of Georgia – the first female to be elected as president in the country's history. As a result of the constitutiona ...

pardoned Ugulava.

Early career

Born in Tbilisi, Ugulava studied at the

Tbilisi Theological Seminary Tbilisi Theological Academy and Seminary ( ka, თბილისის სასულიერო სემინარია, tr; ) is a seminary in Tbilisi, Georgia. It operated from 1817 to 1919 under the name Tiflis Theological Seminary in ...

(1992-4) and the

University of Saarbrücken Saarland University (, ) is a public research university located in Saarbrücken, the capital of the German state of Saarland. It was founded in 1948 in Homburg in co-operation with France and is organized in six faculties that cover all major f ...

(1995-7), and graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy and Sociology at the

Tbilisi State University Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University ( ka, ივანე ჯავახიშვილის სახელობის თბილისის სახელმწიფო უნივერსიტეტი, tr; often shorten ...

in 1998. Having briefly worked as a journalist for a Tbilisi-based Iberia TV,

Internews Internews Network, now Internews, is a 501(c)(3) organization incorporated in California, formed in 1982. It was founded by David M. Hoffman, Kim Spencer, and Evelyn Messinger. The president and CEO is Jeanne Bourgault. Internews Europe is a ...

, and

Transparency International Transparency International e.V. (TI) is a German registered association founded in 1993 by former employees of the World Bank. Based in Berlin, its nonprofit and non-governmental purpose is to take action to combat global corruption with civil s ...

(1997-9), he became a consultant for the Eurasia Foundation in 2000. He directed the

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...

Association of Legal and Public Education from 2001 to 2003, and helped organize the youth organization Kmara! ("Enough"). The Kmara movement played a critical role in the bloodless

Rose Revolution The Rose Revolution or Revolution of Roses ( ka, ვარდების რევოლუცია, tr) was a nonviolent change of power that occurred in Georgia in November 2003. The event was brought about by widespread protests over the ...

, which would bring the reformist leader

to power. Ugulava assumed the position of Deputy Security Minister in the new government and was moved to the post of Governor of

Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti ( Georgian: სამეგრელო-ზემო სვანეთი ) is a region (Mkhare) in western Georgia with a population of 308,358 (2021) and a surface of . The region has Zugdidi as its administrative center ...

in September 2004. On April 20, 2005, he was appointed Chief of the Administration of the

Mayor of Tbilisi

Ugulava was appointed

on July 12, 2005. When this post became elective in 2006, he ran successfully for mayor, and was elected by the Tbilisi Assembly on October 12, 2006 and re-elected through a direct vote on May 30, 2010. After the UNM-dominated central government was defeated by the

Georgian Dream Georgian Dream – Democratic Georgia (GD), also colloquially known as the Kotsebi, is a Conservatism, conservative and populism, populist List of political parties in Georgia (country), political party in Georgia (country), Georgia, which has ...

coalition in the 2012 parliamentary election, Ugulava was suspended on 22 December 2013 from his functions by a court for alleged misuse of funds. He was arrested on July 3, 2014 on charges of money misspending and laundering in the funding of his party's campaign in June municipal elections. His supporters accused the government of politically motivated persecution of Ugulava. On 18 September 2015 a court sentenced him to 4.5 years in jail. On 6 January 2017, Ugulava was released from prison after the Tbilisi Court of Appeal requalified the misspending charges, found him guilty of exceeding official powers, acquitted him of money laundering charges, and shortened his sentence by three years and three months. Shortly after his release he (along with several other senior members of the UNM) left the United National Movement to found a new political party: Movement for Freedom - European Georgia. The split occurred due to ideological and political differences.

External links

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ugulava, Gigi 1975 births Mayors of Tbilisi Journalists from Tbilisi Living people European Georgia politicians United National Movement (Georgia) politicians