NGOs, Rights Activists Criticize Government’s New Draft Drug Law

Parliament put a previously submitted drug bill on hold amidst strong criticism by NGOs and other civil rights groups for a new draft drug policy law substituting the previously proposed bill. After months of negotiations, the government has decided to rally behind the altered draft law, which was put forward by an interagency commission this week.

The initial bill was submitted by rights groups, NGOs, and activists last June to spur the decriminalization process of drugs. For years, the groups have heavily criticized the long prison sentences for the possession of small amount of drugs, with the justice system not even attempting to distinguish drugs effectively or providing other means of support. Advocates for the bill criticize the change by the government to focus on a new bill, which, according to the groups, is not sufficient to deal with the issue at hand.

The government has also received heavy criticism for using the term “liberalization” instead of “decriminalization,” pointing to a lessened version of the law rather than altered prison sentences. The government supported bill attempts to differentiate only between 8 new drug substances, signifying a minor change to the current law which makes no differentiation between 147 out of 207 drug substances illegal in Georgia.

‘The bill corrects only one of the anomalies of Georgian drug policy while neglecting systematic problems and injustices. It’s unfortunate that members of the Interagency Committee agreed on the inconsistent implementation of legal changes,’ a statement issued by the Human Rights Education and Monitoring Center on 28 March said.

Even tiny amounts of drugs can lead to 8-20 year prison sentence, a fact which was recently brought to public attention by the 8-year imprisonment of Mamuka Berdzenishvili, a former employee of the Georgian Public Broadcaster.

Georgian politicians and the Prime Minister support a reform, but over the last years, new bills have been tenaciously delayed. Speaking to Paata Sabelashvili on drugs this week, he mentioned in an exclusive GEORGIA TODAY interview out on Friday why no progress can be seen despite supportive politicians. “There are many politicians - literally in any party one can name one that openly endorses the need to humanize drug policies. It seems like everyone supports the reform, but no one actually enacts it,” Sabelashvili noted.

By Benjamin Music