A local unit of Investment Authority of the UAE’s Ras Al Khaimah (RAK) emirate has purchased 90% of TV and radio holding, Imedi, for undisclosed price.

10% of shares remain in Joseph Kay’s ownership, his legal representative said on February 25.

Kay, who is a distant relative of late tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili, took over the TV station last year – a deal which still remains disputed by the Patarkatsishvili’s family, which claims that Kay managed “to seize” the television stations with the Georgian authorities’ blessing.
 
Ras Al Khaimah’s business interests in Georgia among others also include Mtatsminda amusement part, which in the past was controlled by the late tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili. The park, along with the Imedi TV, is also disputed by the Patarkatsishvili family.

Kay said on February 25, that he had decided to sell shares to RAK Georgia Holding, because he was no longer able to finance the television stations in the light of the global financial crisis, as his other businesses required urgent investments.

“Imedi TV will receive all that financial assistance [from new shareholder], which it needs to return its leading place which it always had,” he told journalists. “As you know, my business interests involve not only Imedi. Unfortunately, all those businesses, in which I am involved, need new investments.”

Ras Al Khaimah Investment Authority (RAKIA) purchased port of Poti last year and is now developing free industrial zone there.

This year RAK Georgia Holding’s daughter company has purchased controlling stakes into the People’s Bank. Former PM, Zurab Nogaideli, and a leader of newly set up opposition party Movement for Fair Georgia, has alleged that Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili’s associates were behind the company not RAK Georgia Holding – the allegation was denied by the Holding itself.