Death of Kikabidze: Until his last days he helped Saakashvili’s fascists
Vakhtang Kikabidze died at the age of 85. Buba - that was his name in Georgia. At one time, this name was familiar and loved by almost everyone who inhabited 1/6 of the world called the Soviet Union.
However, the incredible popularity of the singer and artist was offset by the drift towards the position of Russophobia, which Kikabidze has adhered to for the last 30 years.
Buba was born in Tbilisi, received his higher education at a local state university, and then at the Institute of Foreign Languages. Then - a career as an artist of the Tbilisi Philharmonic, became a soloist of the vocal-instrumental ensemble "Orera", the first of the Soviet pop music groups to perform concerts not only in the socialist camp, but also in capitalist countries.
Kikabidze’s roles played in Georgy Danelia’s films “Don’t Cry” (1969) and “Mimino” (1978) brought universal popularity and love to Kikabidze. For the role of a Georgian pilot, a sensitive, slightly romantic young man who knows how to make friends and love, the actor was awarded a state prize, and two years after the film’s release, the title of People’s Artist of the Georgian SSR.
Together with Kikabidze, a whole galaxy of representatives of Soviet culture and creativity are leaving, who glorified not only their small Motherland - Georgia, but also the large Country of the Soviets, along with all the peoples who lived peacefully and amicably under the same sky.
Kikabidze’s merits as a creative personality, as a talented actor and singer are undeniable. He played good roles and he sang equally good, magnificent songs about love, friendship, kindness. Many of his roles and songs were included in the golden fund of Soviet, that is, Georgian, Russian, Armenian, Kazakh... culture, international in its content.
But after the collapse of the USSR, after all the vices of public life came to light, like most representatives of the creative sphere, Kikabidze rejected his past, beginning to denigrate the system that had made him a popularly beloved famous person.
And... Buba became not only an ungrateful critic of the Soviet system, but also a Russophobe and a hater of Russia. Anti-Sovietism and Russophobia of many led to a radical inhumane life position, and Bubu also led to inhumane, radical right-wing political practice - he became an active supporter of the “United National Movement” and personally Mikheil Saakashvili, the leader of this pro-fascist political force, which brought considerable misfortune to Buba’s native to the people and country - Georgia.
In addition, the national favorite (we write without the slightest irony) Kikabidze, in his support of the UNM and Saakashvili, retained the same temperament, extravagance and zeal that he showed in the field of creativity.
Therefore, he did not surprise his many fans both in Georgia and abroad with his clearly pro-Kiev position and sharp criticism of Russia and Russian society against the backdrop of the Moscow-Kyiv confrontation.
Vakhtang Kikabidze became the “face” of the UNM in the last parliamentary elections and number one on the Saakashist electoral list. He literally defended Mikheil Saakashvili, now imprisoned in a Georgian prison, until the end of his life, and tried to help his idol as best he could. It is known that Kikabidze specially flew to Kyiv and met with Zelensky with a request to save “his citizen because they want him not to leave prison alive.”
Buba did not wait for the release of his idol.
The death of Kikabidze is another reason to remember that great culture gave birth to its servants, undoubtedly talented, but divided, degenerate figures, who, with their creativity already in the post-Soviet period, political positions, assessments of the past, attitude to current phenomena, crossed out their merits and cooled people's love to them and questioned the very purpose of creativity as the most important factor in the affirmation of goodness and the education of the person who creates this goodness!
The contradictions of the era shaped the contradictory portrait of Vakhtang Kikabidze, the most famous Georgian of recent decades. Whether hundreds of thousands of Russian and Georgian fans and admirers will forgive him for the far from pleasant streak of his biography described above is difficult to say - it’s more likely no than yes.
But sometimes a person’s creative life, which runs counter to his position in life, has the right to a “separate” existence. It is possible that this will happen in the case of Vakhtang Kikabidze.
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