Government ordinance for the protection of the employees of AVAS

• The staff of the Authority have returned to work, after the spontaneous strike they held on Wednesday

The former investors in the National Investment Fund (FNI) will no longer be allowed to freeze the accounts used for paying the wages of the employees of the Authority for the Recovery of State Assets (AVAS), after the Government issued an emergency ordinance on the matter, in its Wednesday session. This was confirmed by sources that did not wish to be named.

The Ordinance comes after the activity of the Authority was interrupted on Wednesday, following a spontaneous strike started by several employees unhappy with the fact that they hadn"t been paid last month.

"We have called the president of the AVAS for negotiations and we were promised that our situation would be solved through the issuing of an Emergency Ordinance, which would no longer allow the garnishment of the accounts used for paying the wages of its employees", sources from the Authority said. They also added that the employees of the AVAS returned to work yesterday.

At the end of March, the Senate approved a draft law that stipulates that until December 31st, 2013, the AVAS would pay its liabilities, including those to the creditors of the FNI, out if its revenues from privatization operations, rather than out of the amounts allocated to it through the state budget.

According to the project, "the amounts allocated from the state budget to the Authority For the Recovery of State Assets for the payment of its employee expenses, for its current operations and for representing Romania before the International Court of Arbitration of the Center for the for Solving Investment Disagreements can not be foreclosed upon. The Ordinance issued by the Government on Wednesday tries to help the AVAS continue its operations until the draft law approved by the Senate gets the approval of the Parliament.

However, Wednesday"s Ordinance does not concern the activity of the Romanian National Securities Commission (CNVM), another institution that is required to compensate the former investors of the National Investment Fund (FNI). The employees of the CNVM have however succeeded in getting their salaries, even though the accounts of the Romanian National Securities Commission were garnished, based on a provision of the Labor Code which stipulates that salaries can"t be garnished for a period of about six months. The deadline will expire in June.