The management, hosts, and staff of Georgia’s First Channel (GPB) have publicly apologized for an incident during a live broadcast on June 9, when a 10-year-old girl, Anka, fainted during a performance by a children’s choir on the show “Day on First Channel.”
Apologies were extended to the child, her family, and the other children who participated in the performance. TV presenter Liza Bagrationi (a singer and sister of the wife of Georgia’s sixth president – Ed.) stated that she takes responsibility as the program’s co-host and expressed regret over the incident, emphasizing that the moment the girl fainted went unnoticed in the studio.
Bagrationi stated that this sometimes happens to children due to anxiety, and that the previous day, several members of the group had felt unwell during a concert in Kutaisi.
The official apology was issued after a working meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Georgian Public Broadcaster was held on June 15.
Video footage circulating on social media shows the girl falling and a voice, presumably alerting others to the child’s fall. Earlier, the GPB stated that they believed this voice belonged to someone off-camera.
First Channel also stated that they had reviewed the video footage and security camera recordings. It was established that GPB staff indeed did not capture the moment the girl fainted.
The statement released by the broadcaster noted that had the incident been noticed, the broadcast would have been immediately halted and the necessary response measures taken.