Sebastian Burduja - ultimatum for the management of state-owned energy companies: resignation or dismissal!

The Minister of Energy, Sebastian Burduja, demands the resignation or dismissal of the management of state-owned energy companies in order to fulfill milestone 121 of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, a milestone that establishes corporate governance in all state-owned enterprises.

Yesterday, during the ninth annual conference of the Association of Electricity and Natural Gas Suppliers of Romania (AFEER), the Minister of Energy, Sebastian Burduja, stated: "Milestone 121 has caused us many sleepless nights, and the problem arises from a lack of correlation between the text of Ordinance 109/2011 and the Romanian legislative framework with the European Commission's interpretation of the text regarding the respective milestone in the PNRR. The milestone in the PNRR rather states some principles: transparency, competitiveness, lack of conflicts of interest. And that is why negotiations were held for more than 6 months with the European Commission. Of course, we can maintain our points of view on many cases, but at the end of the day, the Commission's decision requires the withholding of hundreds of millions of euros - it is about 290 million euros in the initial assessment, but we hope that in the future assessment that comes with the publication of the decision, the amount will be lower. But based on an ordinance, a article adopted in the Government, we have already proceeded to certain revocations and appointments of administrators or members of the interim Supervisory Board, such as at the Oltenia Energy Complex and Electrocentrale Craiova. There are several companies that are listed on the stock exchange and that is why I will not make any other assessments because we do not want to upset the market. We have nothing against anyone, but we simply have to do our duty to attract all the European money, not to lose a single penny from the PNRR. Without anger from anyone. I hope that all those who were part of these boards will understand this, will show good faith towards Romania and will resign or submit their mandate or will be revoked, being entitled to six compensatory salaries according to the recently adopted ordinance. After which new selection procedures will be organized".

The Minister of Energy stated that now it is known for sure what the European Commission wants and that he will do everything to ensure that no money is lost from milestone 121 of the PNRR.

We recall that in October 2024 the European Commission sent the Ciolacu government a letter announcing that it was suspending the payment of 1.1 billion euros from the third payment request from the PNRR, due to conflicts of interest and political influences through which the heads of state-owned energy companies were appointed. The Commission analyzed 17 state-owned companies, of which 14 were main companies, plus two others transferred to AAAS and one that is merging with another state-owned company.

"The evidence provided by Romania regarding the selection and appointment of members of the boards of directors and/or supervisory boards of the 17 state-owned enterprises does not demonstrate that the selection and appointment of new members were carried out on the basis of transparent and competitive procedures", the European Commission states in the cited document.

Officials from Brussels have found that in this case there are existing and potential conflicts of interest, as well as unjustified political and hierarchical influences in the selection procedures of the members of the board of directors for 8 of the 17 state-owned companies, namely Hidroelectrica, Nuclearelectrica, Romgaz, Oil Terminal, CONPET, Complexul Energetic Oltenia, Electrocentrale Craiova and Midia Green Energy.