A new board of trustees of the Georgian Public Broadcaster (GPB) will, in a speeded-up process, be formed by the end of February, Parliamentary Chairperson Nino Burjanadze said on January 31.

Burjanadze's announcement follows a joint 12-party opposition memorandum, one of the demand of which was the appointment of a new board by agreement between the opposition and the authorities as quickly as possible.

A competition for board membership was opened on January 18, with a submission deadline of February 17. The entire selection process ordinarily takes an additional 50 days, but Burjanadze said the process would be finalized much sooner.

“As we are politically committed to implementing the agreement [with the opposition] on the Georgian Public Broadcaster as soon as possible and to ensure that the station wins public confidence quickly, we will speed up the process and within thirty days, we will have constituted a new board based on consensus,” Burjanadze said.