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Georgia The Gamsakhurdia Government
Gamsakhurdia's choice to head the new government, Tengiz
Sigua, was almost universally praised. Sigua, formerly director
of a metallurgy institute, had been an adroit and evenhanded
deputy chairman of the Central Election Commission supervising
the 1990 election. The government formed by Gamsakhurdia included
many officials who lacked previous government experience. Only
one full minister was retained from the communist government,
although former deputy ministers were frequently promoted to the
top post in ministries concerned with the economy. Initially, the
large number of remaining communist deputies formed no organized
opposition bloc in the parliament. In fact, the communist party
faded rapidly from the scene, and most of its property and
publishing facilities were seized. The large, modern facility
Shevardnadze had built for the party's Central Committee was
taken over by the Cabinet of Ministers. The rapid decline of the
communists showed that the major attraction of communist party
membership had been the party's position of power; once that
power was lost, the number of active communists dropped almost to
zero. When the new first secretary of the party ran against
Gamsakhurdia for president in 1991, he received less than 2
percent of the vote. After the August 1991 coup in Moscow,
Gamsakhurdia banned the communist party, and deputies elected to
parliament on the communist ticket were deprived of their seats.
Data as of March 1994
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