“LGBT propagandist,” “agent,” “enemy of the country” — these are the words that the leaders of the Georgian Dream have used to describe Nana Dikhaminjia, co-founder of the company Clear Signal Solutions, professor at Alte University, former professor at Missouri University of Science and Technology and Ilia University — a woman who contributes to the development of the technology sector in Georgia and increases the involvement of girls.
Nana Dikhaminjia, with whom the government has been implementing various training courses and projects for years with grants from Western organizations, has now been targeted. Moreover, now that she is fighting for the future of the country through protests, she has been declared an enemy and, in yet another conspiracy theory, accused of taking orders from the West.
In this article, we will introduce you to Nana and you will learn how she ended up from Sokhumi to California, and from California to Rustaveli, at the protests; why she put aside her American career and what she is fighting for in her homeland. She talks about how the attacks by representatives of the Georgian Dream affect her and whether she plans to continue the fight.
Nana was born in Sokhumi to mathematician parents. She says she had a carefree childhood, but struggled with communication. She loved reading books and had difficulty interacting with her peers.
As a child, she considered Pippi Longstocking to be an example of a strong woman: “I was born and raised in Sokhumi before the war. Sokhumi was a city where there were many conventions and you had to follow these conventions, there were many rules. Pippi was a person who broke all the rules, and I really liked that there was a girl who could do that.”
She loved mathematics since childhood. She says it was easy for her, so from an early age she thought she would follow this direction. As a teenager, she realized that mathematics was the language of science and that it explained everything.
“I graduated from university with a degree in mathematics, received a bachelor’s and master’s degree, and then defended my doctoral dissertation in applied mathematics. Professionally, I first switched to programming, working in geoinformation systems for a long time, and at the same time, I was also at the Institute of Applied Mathematics.”
“Then, when I went to America, I started working at the Missouri Electromagnetic Compatibility Laboratory, and there my research shifted to electrical engineering. Even now, in the company I founded, we are mainly working in this direction. These are algorithms for electromagnetic compatibility and signal integrity tasks.”
Vakho Kareli / Aprili Media
Nana came to terms with the stereotypes that mathematics was “not a woman’s subject” quite late — “I had the image of a smart child and never thought that I might know less than someone else in any field because of my gender.”
She says that similar discriminatory and stereotypical approaches still occur today, and family support is crucial for girls in times like these.
“I have several programs where high school girls participate. I teach them about these technologies and try to spark an interest in engineering, programming, robotics. They often tell me that they encounter these stereotypes from relatives, neighbors, or even teachers, and when family support is not high, it really affects the teenager.”
It is important to tell girls from childhood that professions have no sex.
Nana also spoke about the knowledge and experience she gained abroad. She worked at Missouri University of Science and Technology for 4 years. She talks about a completely different work culture, the importance of equal distribution of work, respect from managers and team members, a toxicity-free environment, and access to opportunities.
“When I lived in Georgia, I worked at the Institute of Applied Mathematics, and my research was mainly focused on mathematical modeling, which I could not see directly applied. I started working in a laboratory in America, which is a member of a large consortium. It includes 20 high-tech American companies that directly used our articles and algorithms. This had a great influence on the fact that after I left, several professors and I founded an engineering company together, and what we were doing there, we work on the same types of algorithms, but we package it and sell it to the same companies that were part of this consortium. In other words, scientific work, which was very abstract here, is commercialized there, and we saw directly how it could be used. This is what our country is missing a lot.”
Nana Dikhaminjia periodically came to Georgia from America, implemented various projects with universities and state agencies and returned back. The general public knew her precisely through her academic activities, interviews related to these projects and technologies. However, for the past 2 years, Nana has most often been seen on Rustaveli, at protest rallies. We asked her how she got into activism and why she decided to come to Georgia to fight, when she has a successful career in the USA.
Vakho Kareli / Aprili Media
She says that it was a long process and it all started when she saw the need for volunteer work.
“In Missouri, the high school didn’t have a robotics club, and my son was very interested. I was working in a lab at the time, and I complained to parents several times that the senior classes had [robotics clubs], and in big cities, elementary and middle schools had them, but here we don’t. One of the American parents said to me, you know this field, so go ahead and do it yourself. It was very strange for me, because I had never participated in volunteer work before, but I have complained a lot about why educational technologies are not developed for children. When I looked at what my children were involved in, it turned out that most of these programs are not funded by the state, but are implemented by parents, students, retired professionals, and I realized that I could do the same. So I became a robotics coach, and then I got involved in a lot of things. Before my eyes, a local science center for children was developing.”
As she tells us, this was what pushed her, and when she received an offer from Ilia University to develop engineering programs, she thought that what she was doing in America should be done in her own country as well, and in addition to collaborating with the university, she should also start programs for children.
“I actively cooperated with state organizations, I also cooperated with the Ministry of Education, with the Technology Agency. Last year, when such a strange law was adopted, which was directly in Russian handwriting and exactly repeated what happened in Russia, I realized that we were facing a very big danger. Activism also started last year, otherwise I never thought about getting involved in political processes.”
She says that the situation is much more difficult this year, and while she used to come twice a year, this is the fifth time she has come.
It is impossible to look at this from the outside. For me, there is a very simple principle — if I feel like a part of this society, if I am Georgian and if my homeland is Georgia, then it is my duty to do everything I can. Otherwise, it is completely incomprehensible why I should call myself Georgian. If I can be somewhere comfortable and do nothing to prevent my country from going to Russia and surviving, then I have no right to be Georgian … then I can say that I have no homeland and I live here for myself.
At this stage, her projects have been suspended — because she is constantly at rallies when she comes to Georgia. She thinks that this is the most important thing now. She also talked to us about the reasons why she was specifically protesting the Russian law and why she stood in front of the parliament in March 2023.
“Even if the Russian law was not Russian at all, it is completely incomprehensible in content, the purpose of which is to completely restrict the activities of non-governmental organizations in this country. I am mainly involved in non-formal education and I know formal education well, because I collaborated with two universities, Alte and Ilia University. I could see that scientific education, the development of STEM, all this was done precisely with the funding of foreign organizations and the involvement of non-governmental organizations. First of all, it was very important that in content this was a completely unclear law, the purpose of which was to restrict these non-governmental organizations and foreign funding.
“Secondly, we have seen this in Russia, it developed exactly like this. Moreover, the first version of the law that was adopted in Russia was much softer than the one that was adopted here. That was the main thing.”
Vakho Kareli / Aprili Media
She says that what is happening this year is much more than just the harmfulness of Russian law, as it was followed by a censorship law, which is wrapped in a fictional shell of family purity and fights non-existent “LGBT propaganda”, as well as laws on restrictions on public officials and protests, the suspension of European integration, and a 2-week terror, when up to 500 people were arrested and some were severely beaten and tortured.
“What does propaganda mean? I have propaganda for more girls to learn technology. I have been doing this for 7 years, I have been doing it all the time. I started earlier in America and have been trying to do this in Georgia for 7 years. What is the result of this propaganda? That more girls will have better professions and more opportunities to strengthen themselves economically and the country. Let’s transfer this to the LGBT community:
Is anyone urging anyone to become gay? Have you heard it anywhere? I haven’t heard it anywhere, not even in America. We live in California, the most open, democratic, and equal state, and I’ve never heard anyone urging anyone to become gay. There is no such thing as an invitation. No one can become gay by being invited. No one can change their sexual preference because of an invitation.
As we mentioned at the beginning, the Georgian Dream party assigned Nana the status of an “LGBT propagandist.” This was preceded by her argument with one of the party leaders, Mamuka Mdinaradze, whom she met in the lobby of her building. A video of the communication was released by both Nana and Mdinaradze. It soon went viral on state media and troll pages. A discrediting campaign was launched against Nana, in which politicians, along with trolls, also got involved, including Mariam Lashkhi, who, as Nana says, herself invited her to meetings and thanked her for her involvement.
“It was a very funny meeting with Mdinaradze, who kept calling me a spy and an agent and directly repeated Soviet texts from the 1930s. We can take them out of newspapers and look at how they used the texts. Of course, this is very funny, and all this propaganda of theirs is based on the fact that in 2021 I put a “LOVE IS LOVE” frame on my profile photo, which means that any person has the right to love as they want, as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone.”
Nana says she feels uncomfortable being portrayed as a queer activist because the queer community faces great challenges and struggles for minimal rights, in which she is unable to be intensely involved.
Vakho Kareli / Aprili Media
We were only able to record this interview with Nana at the protest, because she had been involved in protest processes since morning that day — first in the IT-TECH sector march, then with the Public Broadcaster demanding open airtime. She told us that before going to the parliament, she saw the need to go to the Public Broadcaster. When asked why, she answered this way:
“Citizens need the same from the public broadcaster as they do from any media. We need everyone’s voice to be heard equally. The media is a very important tool for propaganda. The fact that we suddenly, in half a year, had the Soviet Union come down on us was very strange to me.”
For example, Mariam Lashkhi, who back in February… I specifically looked her up to see if I was remembering correctly… This person called me in February with a request that we were doing an event on women scientists and, if possible, to advise me on the best way to do it, and suddenly today she announces that I am coming from America, full of assignments, as an agent. This change in half a year, the decline and transformation into a Russian regime, is precisely the result of the kind of propaganda the media is spreading in the country.
Imedi is the main propagandist, the Public Broadcaster also contributes a lot, Rustavi 2 and POSTV are also beyond reproach with their lies. In the case of the Public Broadcaster, it is strange, the change also happened quickly. […] In the regions, there are not opposition channels everywhere, the population is not accessible everywhere, but the Public Broadcaster is accessible everywhere.
According to Nana, the fact that 1 hour a day was returned to television was very important and the voice of protest reached the regions, but even that was reduced. She says that since the Public Broadcaster is financed by the public and it is directly written in its charter that it is its duty to hear the voice of the public, it is important to restore those programs that were open and allowed people to voice their critical voices.
Vakho Kareli / Aprili Media
We spoke to Nana about other propaganda messages that are trying to discredit the public protest, including the fact that the election results are considered falsified without reason.
“I was an observer myself. There is a lot of evidence that a lot of votes were falsified and it was very clearly shown in the OSCE/ODIHR report. It is a 50-page report and if you look at it, if you give it to artificial intelligence to analyze, 15% of what was said would be good. There is always something good, but about 85% is bad. Starting from the legislation, ending with intimidation and leaks. Obviously, we cannot like such elections in any way and from day one we have been demanding the annulment of the election results and the appointment of new elections.”
Another propaganda message that Nana talked about is that the protesters don’t know why they want Europe. To her, the very existence of this question is strange.
“Any developing country wants to become part of a large organization that ensures peace, rapid development, and high standards in all areas,” she says.
You can see what we need European integration and the European Union for directly on the government’s pages until 2022. Moreover, last year and this spring, you can see how they boasted about American and European Union projects.
In her opinion, it is ridiculous to say that we do not need Georgia’s support and assistance and that we have enough money to finance projects that will benefit the country’s development.
“There is no history of a developing country achieving anything on its own without very strong allies. They are trying to convince their supporters of this lie and scare them with invented concepts and fears to counterbalance the benefits that the European Union brings.”
At the end of the interview, Nana talked about her expectations for the development of the protest and emphasized that it will not stop. In her assessment, the regime has shown its filth and does not like to have anyone around who agrees to live in this situation.
“These hundreds of thousands of people that I see every day are the people I taught students with; the people I worked with on developing startups. These are the people who create businesses. You can already see how the voice of business has been heard, even though the state, this regime, is very angry about it and is trying in every way to suppress it.”
“This is the first time that marches of IT and technology representatives have taken place in this country. We see how much pressure is coming from our allied countries, we see what kind of sanctions are coming. All this will not stop, we just have to endure it. Maybe not immediately, but we have to endure it for 1-2 months and, of course, we will win. At this stage, we will save this country from Russia, and then we will have to work hard.”