Georgian Dream Power Broker Mamuka Mdinaradze Resigns as Minister, Quits Politics

Mamuka Mdinaradze — a decade-long Georgian Dream heavyweight who served as parliamentary faction chairman, majority leader and deputy speaker before becoming Minister of Regional Development, and a former State Security Service chief — abruptly resigned his ministerial post and announced he was quitting politics entirely, three days after jailed former PM Irakli Garibashvili's new bribery charges and his public break with party founder Bidzina Ivanishvili. Mdinaradze said the decision was his own after 'ten years of complete immersion in politics,' citing the psychological toll, while PM Irakli Kobakhidze said he and Ivanishvili had initially tried to talk him out of it. Opposition figures speculated he could face the same fate as Garibashvili; analyst Gia Khukhashvili quipped that 'a cabinet of ministers can be formed in prison.'