Ivanishvili says goodbye MIKHEIL SAAKASHVILI, Georgia’s outgoing president, can be accused of many things, but lack of vision is not one. Ten years ago the then 36-year-old Mr Saakashvili led the rose revolution to become the world’s youngest national leader. His country was a traumatised, failing state. Over the next ten years, he led it through a mental revolution, modernising it, shaking off its Soviet legacy and putting it back on the map. He also fought and lost a war with Russia, cracked down on the opposition, dominated the media, interfered with justice and monopolised power.“In our rush to impose a new reality, against the background of internal and external threats, we have cut corners and certainly made mistakes,” Mr Saakashvili said in his farewell speech at the United Nations. The price for those mistakes was the loss of last year’s parliamentary election to Georgian Dream, a coalition led by a reclusive 56-year-old billionaire, Bidzina Ivanishvili, who made his fortune in Russia. Many Georgians rejoiced that Mr Saakashvili’s monopoly on power was broken.On October 27th Georgia will vote for a new president, whose powers…
