Gotsiridze: Removing Kveinishvili from National Bank Council is a violation of law

Former National Bank President and opposition politician Roman Gotsiridze says that removing Nana Keyinishvili, a member of the National Bank Council, from the Council's activities is a violation of law. In his assessment, this may negatively affect the bank's future decisions.

Gotsiridze writes: "Nana Keyinishvili, a member of the National Bank of Georgia Council, has been expelled from the National Bank Council. This is a gross violation of law, and it may adversely affect the National Bank's future decisions. The law does not provide for such a sanction".

According to him, the law "On the National Bank of Georgia" exhaustively defines the limits of restricting a Council member's powers. The Council has no right to temporarily or permanently suspend a member's status or supervisory activities. It may only exclude a member from the discussion and voting on a specific issue, and even then only in strictly defined cases. Gotsiridze says the norm for temporarily suspending powers does not exist in the law, and the law recognizes only two states: active powers or their early termination.

Gotsiridze points to Article 10: the only body that can remove a Council member from office is parliament, and the grounds for removal are exhaustively listed in paragraph 2 of the same article. These are a guilty verdict, incapacity, failure to perform duties for 3 months, conflict of interest, or a personal application. In his words, until parliament makes a decision on removal, the Council member retains legal status, and depriving someone of status or fully blocking their activities through an internal Council vote is a direct violation of law and an excess of powers.

As the only legitimate mechanism, Gotsiridze names recusal on a specific issue. According to him, this applies when an agenda item relates to the personal, financial or property interest of a Council member or a member of their family. In this case, Article 13 and the recusal norms of the General Administrative Code apply. A member may declare self-recusal. If they do not, but there is a substantiated suspicion or evidence of a conflict of interest, any other Council member may raise the recusal issue. The Council votes on the motion, and by majority decision the member is removed only from voting on that specific issue. On subsequent issues, they continue to participate in deliberation and voting with full rights.

Gotsiridze says that if the Council nevertheless exceeded its powers and unlawfully suspended a member's powers, the Council itself would become a violator of law. Under the General Administrative Code, an act adopted by an administrative body beyond its competence is void, and the Council does not have a parliamentary function and cannot deprive a member of their powers.

In his assessment, if the Council continues its sessions without the "unlawfully removed" member, all subsequent decisions adopted by a "defective composition" will face a serious risk of being annulled. Gotsiridze writes: "The National Bank's leadership has landed in serious trouble, and the National Bank will find itself in a dire legal crisis".