Argirom International Group, controlled by businessman Iosif Armas, has lost the contract for collecting the debts Romania has to recover from Angola, following the foreign trade operations conducted before 1989.
The debts were ceded to UK's Maxima Group Plc, which has also taken over Romania's receivables on Mozambique, previously ceded to Debt Advisory International, according to Government Decisions recently published in the Official Gazette.
"The time when we were supposed to collect the debt has passed. We failed to collect it because it turned out to be a very difficult job," Iosif Armas, Argirom Group chairman told Ziarul Financiar. He did not say exactly when the company was supposed to recover Angola's debts and only specified the time frame was of "about six to nine months." Armas, who is also a PSD (Social Democrat Party) deputy, said he did not have any more debt-collection contracts and that he was not sure he would venture into this business again.
The officials of the UK-based Maxima Group had not returned ZF's calls by the time the story was ready for print. The corporate website shows Maxima to deal in assets recovery, debt management, intellectual property protection, fraud risk analysis, as well as in industrial counterespionage or redemption of people kidnapped.
How come Maxima Group became interested in Angola's or Mozambique's debts to Romania? "We have an interdepartmental committee handling the debt collection and comprising Finance Ministry, Foreign Ministry and National Bank representatives who analyse the offers that come in and then suggest them to the Government. The two firms (Argirom and Debt Advisory i.e.) failed to comply with the contractual provisions, and now we have better offers in terms of speedier collection and smaller fees," Finance Ministry sources told Ziarul Financiar.
Pursuant to the cession contract signed by the Government and Argirom SA in November 2000, the receivables ceded to the group were worth $18.6 million made up of principal ($15.7 million) and interests ($2.8 million).
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