Georgian Mayor’s Family Is Behind Secretive Hotel Project in Picturesque Mountain Town

In the mountainous Georgian municipality of Lentekhi, a mysterious construction project is underway. It lies on a road on the outskirts of town, on the way to the area’s springs, where local people drink the water for its healing effects.

The building site does not bear the usual informational signs detailing the construction schedule, contractor’s name, and design details. It is not fenced off and spills onto the sidewalk, stoking anger among local residents. 

Workers at the site told reporters from OCCRP’s Georgian member center iFact that the building belonged to the mayor of Lentekhi, Gia Oniani.

In fact, reporters learned that the mysterious property is being built by a company owned not by the mayor, but by his wife. Mayor Oniani had held a two-thirds stake in the firm for years, but handed his shares to his wife before he took office in 2021.

But although the mayor’s wife is the owner on paper, in reality Oniani is still deeply involved in the company, which he refers to as a "family business" that he helped found. When an undercover reporter from iFact called him, posing as a potential client, he said he was still involved in making decisions about the direction of the company, despite legal restrictions preventing Georgian public officials from doing business while in office. 

At the same time, the mayor issued a construction permit for the hotel earlier this year, which experts said created a significant conflict of interest.

Contacted later for comment, Oniani denied being personally involved in the hotel project, but said it would be a great thing for Lentekhi.

“It’s a small hotel, which will beautifully blend into Lentekhi’s infrastructure. It’s practically the first investment Lentekhi has seen, and it should, in principle, be a positive development for everyone,” he said.

He denied that there was any conflict of interest in how he had awarded a construction permit to his wife’s company. 

“It’s not, of course, it’s not. Does this mean that my family shouldn’t have any breathing space just because I hold a position?” he said.

Experts said iFact’s findings were emblematic of a wider problem in Georgia, where many politicians also do business on the side and conflicts of interest are common.

"We have a lot of deputies in parliament who are big businessmen in various sectors of the economy and actually continue their activities in their companies,” said Sandro Kevkhishvili, head of Transparency International’s anti-corruption program in Georgia.

Kevkhishvili described Mayor Oniani’s involvement in his wife’s company as “incompatible” with his public duties. “If they are in public service, this should be their main and only job,” he said.

Georgian law prohibits public officials from holding any position in a business, working in a company in any capacity or doing paid work outside their official duties. 

A chapter of Georgia’s Fight Against Corruption law states that "a public servant has no right to hold any position in any enterprise." 

However, it is common for newly elected officials to take advantage of a loophole in this law by simply handing their businesses to a close family member, according to Aleksandre Svanishvili, a professor at the Georgian Institute of Public Affairs who studies local government.

Much of the time, officials who hand over their stakes “are still running the businesses themselves,” he said.

Both Svanishvili and Kevkhishvili said a lack of enforcement and punishment for flouting restrictions on business activities meant officials were effectively given carte blanche to continue sidestepping the rules.

Georgian criminal law also states that if a public official uses his or her power for personal advantage, they can be punished by a fine or a jail term of up to five years, as well as a ban on the right to hold an official position for up to three years.

Journalists in Georgia have previously exposed how other elected officials remain linked to the businesses they supposedly handed over. In April, iFact reported how then opposition MP Dilar Khabuliani appeared to remain closely involved in his family businesses, which he had signed over to young relatives. After Khabuliani cast a vote in parliament for the ruling party, those businesses received favorable decisions from local authorities.

A “Family Business” 

iFact began looking into the Lentekhi hotel after a local resident got in touch about what they believed were irregularities around its construction: the lack of informational signboard, the apparent flouting of safety norms, and the absence of any public information. 

When reporters visited the construction site in August, they could not find any informational sign or banner. Workers at the site told reporters:  "We don’t know about the project. Gia Oniani has it — he’s the one building it.”

The head of the supervisory service that should oversee safety at the construction site in Lentekhi, which is not fenced off, is a relative of the mayor. In fact he is married to the mayor's sister-in-law, who was one of the original founders of the company building the hotel.

His name is Giorgi Gulbani, head of City Hall’s Supervision Department. Gulbani insisted an information board had been installed at the site after warnings were issued, but when reporters visited in November that was still not the case.

Mayor Oniani also told reporters in late November that the informational board was still “being prepared.”

For locals, the Lentekhi construction project is a daily reminder of an apparent lack of official accountability. A resident near the site told reporters: "They’ll expand it as they wish. Here, anything goes."

Although there is a specific area on the municipality’s website for the publication of building permits, it remains empty, despite a legal requirement to make that information public. Reporters made an official request at Lentekhi City Hall to obtain the construction permit information about the mysterious building site.

The documents sent to reporters showed that a company called Business Monitoring and Security Service LLC was awarded permission to build a three-story hotel in May 2024. 

According to incorporation documents filed with Georgia’s public companies registry, the company is fully owned by Oniani’s wife, Kristina Revishvili. 

As mayor, Oniani approves all construction permits. Planning documents show that he signed off on the permit to his wife’s firm.

The documents provided by City Hall also showed that the company originally presented the construction project as a two-story commercial center in 2023 and was given a permit for that. Revishvili later wrote to local authorities requesting to change the existing permission to allow the building to be a hotel instead, and for an extra story to be built. 

Within less than a month, in May 2024, she was granted both requests and a two-year construction permit was issued for an 18-unit apartment hotel.

Companies registry information shows that before he took office as mayor, Oniani owned 67 percent of the shares of Business Monitoring and Security Service LLC. The remaining shares were owned by his wife’s sister, Nino Revishvili. 

In July 2021, just months before being elected to the mayorship, he transferred his shares to his wife, Kristine Revishvili. Two years later, Nino Revishvili transferred her shares to her sister, and since then Kristine has owned 100% of the company.

An undercover reporter for iFact wanted to learn more about the company, so she called its publicly listed phone number, posing as a potential client. A man who said he was the manager of the company gave the reporter the mayor’s mobile phone number for more information.

“I am the head, but above me is the head of the company, Gia Oniani. I will give you his number and he will tell you everything in detail,” the man said. 

iFact’s reporter then phoned the mayor, posing as a Turkish medical company employee who needed security for a new medical office where expensive equipment would be stored.

Oniani spoke to her at length, laying out the different services the company could provide, including video monitoring and physical security. 

He mentioned that he had “another job” but said he continues to give “recommendations and instructions” to the family members in the business. 

“Look, this company is basically a family business, you could say. My family is involved—my son works there, my spouse too,” he told the undercover reporter on the call. 

“Right now, I’m focusing on another job, but this company is something I’ve built myself, something I’ve grown. So, I provide the initial recommendations and instructions, and then my family manages things from there, so to speak.”