Piperea: "The claim of the AVAS against Oltchim comes from the loans which were guaranteed by the state and which the plant did not repay"

The receivers of Oltchim Râmnicu Vâlcea, Gheorghe Piperea and Niculae Bălan, have completed the preliminary list of the company's creditors, which has led to major surprises concerning the receivable of the AVAS.

Lawyer Gheorghe Piperea said: "We had the surprise of finding that this receivable was generated in 1995. The receivable comes from bank loans contracted and not paid by Oltchim. The banks foreclosed on the state and that is how the AVAS came to be a creditor of the plant of Vâlcea".

He said that there are 32 appendixes to the guarantee granted by the state, for the loan taken out by Oltchim, which means that the government has tolerated the company's situation. Between 1995 and 2002, the receivable of the AVAS has increased five times, to about 165 million dollars.

Lawyer Gheorghe Piperea concluded: "This aspect shows how the government has behaved over the last 20 years when it comes to Oltchim. The insolvency of Oltchim has far deeper roots than 2009, and the state has tolerated the reckless spending of the public funds and the increase of the company's debts".

The preliminary chart of the receivables, completed by the receivers amounts to a total of 780 million Euros. The receivers were expecting the debts to reach about 1 billion Euros, according to Gheorghe Piperea. The state is the biggest creditor of the plant, through the receivables owned by the AVAS and Electrica SA. Third on the creditors' chart is BCR, with about 78 million Euros.

The first meeting of the creditors of Oltchim will take place on Monday, where they will decide whether or not they will confirm the receivers and the creditors' committee will be elected, which, aside from the representatives of the AVAS, Electrica and BCR, will also include representatives of the tax administration and of the unsecured creditors.