Baobabs are viewed as a tree of life in their native Africa, but that symbolism does not travel well: an attempt to transplant eight giant baobab trees to Georgia resulted in their death. 

So, no wonder these unique trees attracted the attention of Georgia’s political éminence grise and gardener-in-chief, Bidzina Ivanishvili. The all-powerful billionaire, who plants big trees in his park, while cultivating obedient officials to run Georgia, decided not too long ago that baobabs would make a lovely addition to an arboreal arcadia that he built for himself on the Black Sea. 

He uprooted eight of the trees from their native habitat in Kenya and brought them to Georgia, replanting them in his personal botanical garden. The migrant trees, however, didn’t acclimate well to their new surroundings.

In death, as in life, the imported trees have been a touchstone of controversy. From the start of the entire saga, arborists and environmentalists voiced objections to Ivanishvili’s baobab shopping spree. His tree agents flew drones over the rural stretches of Kenya’s coastal Kilifi County to find preferred specimens. They offered local farmers prices of up to $3,000 roughly per trunk, the Guardian reported last year.   

It took costly feats of logistics to dig out the massive trees in Kilifi and bring them to the Guria region of Georgia. The entire process faced headwinds from Kenyan conservationists, who described the venture as “biopiracy.” 

George Gvasalya, the middle-man who arranged the purchases, brushed aside the objections in media comments, claiming that he was in fact saving baobabs that otherwise could’ve been felled to make way for maize plantations. His claims, however, did not assuage the scheme’s many critics. 

“The point is that you are taking a whole mature tree and ripping it out of the ground and then transporting it halfway across the world to replant it. I don’t see that there can be any conservation justification for that,” Gus Le Breton, the board chairperson of the African Baobab Alliance, told Mongabay, a nature news magazine.   

Some farmers in Kilifi County agreed to sell the trees to the overseas billionaire, but others opposed the idea, saying that they feel spiritual affinity with trees, according to local media reports. Village elders called for conducting rituals to appease gods – some local communities believe that baobabs serve as the homes of gods – and demanded that the government assist with the effort, Kenya’s Nation newspaper reported. 

Protests eventually compelled Kenyan authorities to launch an investigation. Adding to the controversy, transportation of the massive trees reportedly damaged power supply infrastructure in the villages that lay in the way of the traveling trees. 

Similar scenes played out in Georgia a few years earlier, when Ivanishvili began uprooting trees across Georgia to move them to his seaside arboretum. In a spectacle worthy of a Ray Bradbury novel, scores of gargantuan tulip and magnolia trees, all standing upright on massive haulers, traversed through the Georgian countryside a few years ago, often chased by children and reporters. Electricity supply cables and railway lines had to be pulled down to let the plantings pass. Mounted on barges, the trees then sailed along the shore to where Ivanishvili wanted them. 

Long story, short; Kenyan authorities eventually granted the trees exit visas to proceed to Georgia. Local environmentalists alleged that it was added fees from the Georgian side that convinced Kenyan government to allow the trees to proceed with their trip. The embattled baobabs finally reached Georgia last October, only to die recently at their foster home, the Shekvetili DendgrologicalPark. 

The tragic end of the trees led to calls in Kenya to ban the export of baobabs. In Georgia, the case is seen as a commentary on the perils of unchallenged power. 

Ivanishvili sees himself as a nature lover and protector of Georgia, but domestic critics view him as a threat to both nature and democracy. He tends to cast anyone who opposes his plans as an enemy of the state. In a vitriolic speech given in Tbilisi last April, for example, he lashed out at Western criticism of the Georgian parliament’s adoption of “foreign agents” legislation that enhances governmental power to restrict non-governmental activity, especially the monitoring of official actions. He accused civil society groups and Western governments of harboring revolutionary intent. “The financing of NGOs, which presents itself as help for us, is in reality for strengthening (foreign) intelligence agencies, and for bringing them to power,” he said.

The baobab affair is no exception to Ivanishvili’s playbook. Administrators at his personal park, along with government officials, have blamed opposition party leaders, independent media outlets and democracy watchdogs for the trees’ demise, making an implausible claim that the criticism they constantly level at Ivanishvili was directly responsible for the baobobs’ deaths.

The park administration claimed that delays in transportation of the trees caused by alleged complaints aired by Ivanishvili’s opponents to Kenyan authorities caused the uprooted baobabs to become stuck in limbo (the trees were uprooted in 2021, but did not arrive in Georgia until last year). The stress of this experience and the lack of adequate care affected the health of the trees, Ivanishvili’s allies contend. 

By the park administration’s own reckoning, the trees did live for eight months after being planted in Georgia last October. Nevertheless, the episode serves as “another reminder of the malign and destructive battles waged by the so-called opposition we have roosting in Georgia,” park administrators said. 

Meanwhile, when commenting on the trees, Tbilisi mayor and Ivanishvili loyalist, Kakha Kaladze, characterized the country’s main opposition party as a source of all sorts of trouble for the nation.     

A figurative Georgian expression posits that a tree will die if you keep yelling at it. It looks like this expression has taken on a literal meaning.