Creditors are requesting the dismissal of Iosif Armaş from the management of "Argirom Internaţional"

The creditors of "Argirom Internaţional" will vote today on the proposal to dismiss businessman Iosif Armaş as manager of the company, at the proposal of the National Administration of State Reserves (ANRSPS), the company"s main creditor. Among others, the ANRSPS accuses Armaş of deliberately procrastinating the completion of the bankruptcy proceedings of "Argirom Internaţional" and want to dismiss him from any management position that he is holding in the companies in which Argirom holds more than 30% of the shares.

The ANRSPS is also requesting the summoning of the general shareholder"s meeting of SC "Hercules" SA, in which SC "Argirom Internaţional" SA is a majority shareholder, in order to propose the following: the changing of the board of directors and of its chairman, the beginning of the reorganization of the company in order to investigate the sale of the company"s assets and the recovery of the assets which were fraudulently sold when "Argirom Internaţional" SA entered insolvency. Another item on the agenda is the immediate sale of the building located at 76, Calea Plevnei, in the first district of Bucharest.

Corneliu Manu, the spokesperson of ANRSPS said: "The bankruptcy case of < Argirom International > has been on the docket of the court of Bucharest since 2007. Based on the behavior of the receiver and his failure to fulfill his obligations, we consider that he (ed. note: Iosif Armaş) is procrastinating the completion of the bankruptcy procedure.

We will also say that that he refuses to answer our requests for a statement concerning the state of the assets of < Hercules >, in which < Argirom International > holds 61.8%. As a result, shareholders can request that the bankruptcy judge remove his right of receivership, based on the continued losses of the debtor and the unlikelihood of a rational operational plan".

He declined to provide any more details on the methods used in the fraudulent sale of assets in this specific bankruptcy case, and he said that for now, he cannot discuss the total amount of the claims of the territorial units of the ANRSPS against "Argirom International". Iosif Armaş was unavailable for comment on the accusations made by the ANRSPS until the paper went to print.

At the end of May, central and local papers reported that the General Department of Public Finance (DGFP) has put on sale the properties that "Hercules" owns in the Băile Herculane resort. The DGFP is asking for 20 million lei for the hotels "Afrodita" and "Roman". The DGFP of the county of Caraş-Severin foreclosed on "Hercules" SA as early back as the beginning of May. Other hotels which will be auctioned off in order to collect on the amounts owed by the company to the state include "Decebal", "Diana" and "Minerva", which are some of the most well known hotels in the resort. At the end of May, Iosif Armaş had stated that he would pay off the company"s debts to the state.