Non-partisan MP Gocha Pipia’s demand that all cabinet members be required to reveal their ethnic background and religious faith, caused an uproar during the parliamentary session on June 10, before the approval of the new cabinet by the lawmakers.
 
Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania, who was delivering a speech over the new cabinet’s plans, said he “is proud of the Armenian origins of my mother.”
 
“But I am ashamed when I hear these kind of questions [referring to MP Pipia’s demand] raised in the Parliament,” Zurab Zhvania added.  
 
“These are the ravings of a madman. In a normal country, people like him [MP Pipia] are jailed," Economy Minister Kakha Bendukidze said in response to Pipia’s statement.