Three years ago, when the Abkhaz people were celebrating their independence, no one could have thought that their unanimity would be broken to pieces and the people would be divided into two camps by two opposite points of view, both imposed by outside forces. And now one half of the Abkhaz people is demanding a thorough investigation of the activities of one of the candidates, while the other half wants all dubious PR-techniques to be banished from the pre-election campaigning.
At the beginning of the pre-election campaign all experts agreed that common PR tricks won’t work in Abkhazia: the country is too small and under-populated, the people have strong patriotic feelings uniting them, and people know each other quite well. The usual PR techniques had already failed in the 2004 elections.
Therefore, PR-managers had to search for other ways, and they found them: this time they decided to gamble on the most sacred memory of the Abkhaz people – their Patriotic War. Veterans expressed their distrust towards one of the candidates, Alexander Ankvab, and accused him of betraying Abkhazia's national interests. During this rally an interview with Tenguiz Kitovani was shown, in which he accused Ankvab of helping Georgians by giving away Abkhaz military plans in 1993.
Tenguiz Kitovani is considered to be a military criminal by the Abkhaz people. When the Abkhaz-Georgian conflict was flaring up, Kitovani occupied the chair of Georgian Defense Minister, and it was he who ordered the tank assault on Sukhumi in 1992. All Kitovani’s efforts to conquer Abkhazia failed, and in 1999, after spending several years in prison, he emigrated to Russia and proclaimed himself an activist of the Georgian opposition. The Georgian authorities, in turn, accused him of cooperating with Russian special services.
After these events the name of Kitovani was almost forgotten until recently, when he gave the above-mentioned interview. It is obvious that his claims are nothing more than an attempt to manipulate Abkhaz public opinion, to exploit people’s patriotic feelings: usually, when such accusations are made, one confirms them with some evidence, but in this case Kitovani presented none. However, the Soviet ‘tradition’ to unconditionally believe everything said on the TV-screen is still strong among Abkhaz people. In response, Ankvab chose to remind the people of the ‘deeds’ of his accuser rather than make excuses and justify himself. Such a reaction is consistent with Ankvab’s image of a tough and sombre politician. More extensive comments are made by his allies. One of them, for example, said that Ankvab doesn’t believe that such blunt slander could come from Sergey Shamba, his principle opponent. It is true that such a crude way to discredit an opponent isn’t characteristic of the tactful Shamba, but it is also true that he’s the one to gain the most benefit from such a diversion.
Right after the first scandal came another one: this time Shamba himself was injured in a car crash. It is true that traffic accidents are far too common in Abkhazia, so there’s no need to imagine that this was some kind of an attempt on Shamba’s life. Another aspect of this incident is of much greater interest: even though Shamba’s injuries were light and doctors said that he could resume his normal activities, the TV-debates of the presidential candidates were cancelled due to the accident. This public discussion should have been the first of its kind in Abkhazia and people were expecting it with anticipation. It seems that the public debates will not now happen during this presidential campaign.
Ekaterina Tesemnikova, exclusively to VK
