Parliament confirmed on September 18 four members of seven-seat board of the Financial Supervisory Agency, a body which is being established after banking oversight functions have been removed from the National Bank of Georgia.

Four members of the board, who have been nominated by the government, are Irakli Kovzanadze; Ekaterine Galdava; Sascha Ternes, and Efrem Urumashvili.
 
Irakli Kovzanadze has served as CEO of the state-owned investment fund Partnership Fund since late 2012. He was chairman of parliamentary committee for finance and budget in 2004-2008.
 
Ekaterine Galdava has served as director of the internal audit department at former PM Bidzina Ivanishvili’s Cartu Bank since May, 2012. In 2005-2007 she was vice president of the National Bank of Georgia, overseeing banking supervision department.

Sascha Ternes is a managing partner at the recently launched real estate, asset and property management Ternes Real Estate Fund. In 2012-2014 he was CEO of ProCredit Bank Georgia and deputy CEO of Bank of Georgia in 2014-2015.
 
Efrem Urumashvili has been a partner in Tbilisi-based corporate law firm Nodia, Urumashvili & Partners; he served as deputy chief financial officer at the Bank of Georgia in 2007-2010.

Kovzanadze, Galdava and Ternes have been confirmed as board members for a seven-year term and Urumashvili for five-year term.

The government, according to the law, can nominate five out of seven board members. Government’s representative in the parliament, Shalva Tadumadze, said that a candidate for the fifth seat will be nominated later.

Two other seats in the board will be taken by the president of the National Bank of Georgia (NBG) and one more member of NBG’s board.

The head of the Financial Supervisory Agency will be nominated by its board members and confirmed by the Parliament.

Bill, removing banking supervisory functions from NBG and transferring them to a separate agency, was adopted by the Parliament in July, but it drew criticism from international financial institutions, business associations, opposition parties, a group of civil society organizations and from the central bank itself.

President Giorgi Margvelashvili vetoed the bill in late July, but the Parliament overturned it on September 3.