THE PRIVATIZATION OF CFR MARFA / BĂSESCU REITERATES WHAT "BURSA" WROTE ABOUT A WEEK AGO: "The government approved the privatization of CFR Marfă, but forgot to publish it in the Official Gazette"

The government approved the privatization of CFR Marfă, but forgot to publish in the Official Gazette, Traian Băsescu, noted yesterday, after the BURSA newspaper reported this as early as one week ago, in the article called "The contract approved by the Government for the privatization of CFR Marfă - kept secret", published on July 30, in which we wrote: "Tomorrow (ed. note: July 31st) a week will have passed since the Government approved the Decision for the privatization of CFR Marfă, but in the Official Gazette nothing was published in that regard, that is even as other Government Decisions get published on the very day they are made, or, in exceptional situations, even during the week-ends".

Even today, the Government, has yet to publish this law in the Official Gazette, even though the latter has came under the direct control of the government since last year.

The president stressed that the failure to publish the Decision concerning the privatization of CFR Marfă in the Official Gazette is delaying the signing of the contract.

"The fact that it doesn't get published (ed. note: the law) in the Official Gazette is preventing the signing of the contract, with everything that entails: the Government can't enforce the collateral that has already been submitted, of 10 million (ed. note: Euros) - essentially, the whole process has been left hanging -, not only that, but the commitments to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank (WB) and the European Union (EU) are also being broken".

Traian Băsescu said that had the privatization of CFR Marfă been his responsibility, he would have long ago made decisions on this process, and said that "CFR Marfă is not doing the rounds between the two palaces, it is parked in the Victoria palace and it seems like the locomotive has run out of steam".

The president continued: "If I was the prime-minister, I would speed up the procedures as much as possible. Because, I would either stand the chance of collecting the 202 million Euros (ed. note: the price that Grup Feroviar Român - the investor which won the call for tenders has agreed to pay) and at the same time, I have the chance of negotiating compliance with the terms for the modernization of the companies, which are part of the strategy that the Government has made a commitment to, and I would impose a schedule for the modernization of the acquisition of new, modern cars (...) either that, or, if the winner, GFR, doesn't come up with the money and doesn't accept the terms included in the privatization strategy, the Government can easily resume the privatization procedure in the form stipulated in the agreement with the Fund".

Traian Băsescu reiterated that the CSAT has no role in approving the privatization contracts, regardless of whether those companies are big or small. The official also said that on Friday, he summoned the meeting of the Country's Supreme Defense Council, for the privatization of CFR Marfă, at the request of the Government, which did not ask for the approval of the procedure, but merely for the issue to be placed on the agenda.

"The government has pledged to complete the privatization by the end of September. Being aware of this commitment, I have urgently summoned the meeting of the CSAT, especially since nothing is being asked except placing the issue on the agenda. In the forwarding address, as well as in the prime-minister's cover letter, which shows that he deliberately wanted to go on holiday and then send the letter to the Government's General Secretariat - which is not the nicest thing to do, but we will go on, for the sake of cohabitation - in this letter the request to put the issue on the agenda comes from Article no. 4, letter d, of the law 415/2002", the president said.

According to Traian Băsescu, if the Romanian state suspends the privatization procedures, it will have to pay damages: "If the privatization were to fail, as a representative of the Romanian state, I would wish for it fail due to the partner in the privatization, rather than due to the lack of courage of the state to see the process through. Because freezing the privatization process will do nothing but cause millions in damages to accrue, in lawsuits that would last years, but would be extremely costly in the end".

The official said that the manner in which the bidding process has taken place in the case of CFR Marfă was already predicting a failure, because he is still feeling skeptical that the owner of GFR, Gruia Stoica, will be able to find the money to buy the majority stake in CFR Marfă.

Saying that the asked the intelligence services to check whether the data concerning the privatization of CFR Marfă has reached all those who were entitled to receive it, Băsescu said that the services have confirmed that the information on that subject have been remitted to the prime-minister and to the Minister of Transports.

Băsescu stressed that he did not specifically ask for bulletins on CFR Marfă from the intelligence services; instead those were sent "automatically" at the initiative of those institutions.