To read Part One, please click here.
For all their personal friendship, President Petro Poroshenko’s appointment of Mikheil Saakashvili as governor of Odesa province in Ukraine is the ultimate merit-based appointment. In Georgia, Saakashvili had presided over the boldest and most successful reform programs of any country in Europe’s East (see Part One in EDM, June 2).
Introducing Saakashvili to the assembled Odesa public, Poroshenko remarked how Georgia’s capital Tbilisi, the sea ports, tourism sector, investment climate, the state administration and civil service, had all “changed beyond recognition“ in Georgia within a few years (2004–2012). Poroshenko seems to anticipate a repeat performance …read more
Source: The Jamestown Foundation