Property seized by the state from a company, affiliated with Georgian Dream leader Bidzina Ivanishvili, has been sold through online auction for over GEL 8.76 million (about USD 5.3 million).

National Bureau of Enforcement (NBE) at the Ministry of Justice put on auction on July 26 property of LLC Burji after the company’s failure to pay GEL 11 million fine imposed earlier last month for alleged violation of political party funding rules.

Auctioned property included real estate in Tbilisi and Sachkhere with total area of over 36,000 square meters and 203 vehicles of various types, among them cars, minibuses, pick up vehicles and cargo trucks, as well as several bulldozers and tractors.

Starting price of the property was GEL 5,153,831, half the market value of the seized property, according to the NBE. 

Total of thirty bids were placed by two bidders before the online auction was closed on Thursday evening.

Two bidders, participating in the auction, were identified as ‘user #1’ and ‘user #2’ with the latter making winning bid, pledging to pay GEL 8,761,513, just less than four minutes before the auction was closed.

Although online auction system makes it possible to track bids it is not possible to identify who a bidder is.