President Saakashvili said on April 29, that “a very useful process of cleaning” of the Georgian politics was now underway in the country.

He said that now it was the time for the politicians to make a choice between “moving to the next level of the Georgian politics” and going back to the street politics of late 80s and early 90s. He, however, said the latter option was no longer possible, because the Georgian state institutions were strong and functional now.

Speaking with a group of journalists while visiting a cement factory in Rustavi, Saakashvili said that the authorities’ tactic of allowing the opposition its campaign of ‘town of cells’ with blocking the capital’s main thoroughfares was not at all a sign of the government’s weakness.

“This is a position of strength,” he said. “This is the position of strength, on the one hand because it gives an opportunity to all the small groups to express fully everything they want to say; and on the other hand [it gives an opportunity] to the society to see what kind of forces they have to deal with and to fully understand what is the balance of power and what the views of various groups are and also in general to clean the political process.”

“What is now happening is cleaning of everything and clarifying of everything; if someone has an ability to see something – of course our society has this ability, people are wise and they see everything very well – I hope everything what has been seen by our society in recent days will be maintained in their memory for a long time in order to have a long-term stability,” Saakashvili said.

He said that people were not interested in the agenda of “politicians from the Tbilisi center” – the term which he used to refer to the opposition parties, which are behind the ongoing protests demanding the President’s resignation.

He also reiterated that the economic difficulties were the major source of concern for the people and that was the issue “on which we should be speaking about.”

Saakashvili’s these remarks were not reported by any of the three key national broadcasters. Although the national televisions have covered in brief the President’s visit to the cement factory in Rustavi, they only aired Saakashvili’s remarks about the factory itself, but not his comments on the political developments. Tbilisi-based pro-opposition, Maestro TV, showed these remarks fully. An abridged version of these remarks was also posted on the President’s official website.