On April 2, it became known that the Head of the State Security Service, Grigol Liluashvili, voluntarily resigned and was to be appointed Minister of Regional Development (the Ministry of Regional Development and Infrastructure was accordingly divided into two). However, due to disagreements with Irakli Kobakhidze, he will no longer hold the post.

Although legislation of Georgia provides for a multi-step procedure for appointing the Head of the State Security Service (which takes some time), the public learned about the replacement only on April 2, and on April 4, the Georgian Parliament elected Anri Okhanashvili as the Head of the State Security Service by a vote of 79 to 0.

According to the Law of Georgia on the State Security Service, the term of office of the head of the Service is 6 years. Grigol Liluashvili has been holding the position of the Head of the State Security Service since October 17, 2019. Accordingly, his six-year term of office was due to expire in October 2025. According to the legislation, the same person cannot be appointed to the above position twice in a row.

The events surrounding the State Security Service in recent days are another clear proof that the agency has never been independent and served the interests of a specific party. The appointment of the political figures of Georgian Dream - Anri Okhanashvili and his deputies (first deputy - Irakli Beraia and deputies - Gela Geladze and Levan Kharanauli) has made the agency more politicized, which will further hamper its political neutrality in the future.

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Since 2015, the State Security Service has been formed as a closed agency with broad powers. According to the promise, it was to be equipped only with an analytical function, although it has an investigative function as well, and its investigative jurisdiction has been expanding over the years. The State Security Service has been given the mandate to investigate criminal cases that, by their nature, do not represent a state security issue and do not fall within the scope of the Service's activities, disproportionately expanding the Service's influence and power. For example, the State Security Service has the authority to investigate all crimes committed by officials (including negligence crimes).

In addition to the investigative mandate directly granted to the Service by law, there are frequent cases when cases are forwarded to the agency for investigation on the basis of articles of the Criminal Code that, according to the order of the Prosecutor General of Georgia on determining the investigative and territorial investigative jurisdiction of criminal cases, do not fall under its jurisdiction or its work directions.

In recent years, the State Security Service has held a number of noisy press conferences to announce the start of an investigation into a coup d’état or the attempted assassination of Bidzina Ivanishvili. However, beyond the one-time statement, no other information has been made public. In addition, the statements of the State Security Service about the start of an investigation coincided with acute political crises and were clearly aimed at causing reputational damage to the opponents of Georgian Dream rather than at identifying real threats or responding to them legally.   

Despite the fact that the funding of the agency has been increasing over the years, it is clear that its resources are being spent irrationally. Instead of taking care of the country's security, informing the public in this direction and taking proactive steps, it has become yet another agency that serves the interests of one political force. The absence of parliamentary control over the Service and just formal annual reports have made it an even more closed agency.

In order to improve the activities of the State Security Service, the main recommendation of the Democracy Research Institute has been to strip it of its investigative powers and to strengthen parliamentary control.