Turning into shares the $24 million debt the Resita-based plant has to pay to the Finance Ministry for instalments of state-pledged loan, could result into the Romanian State becoming main shareholder again, Privatisation minister Ovidiu Musetescu yesterday said.
"Resita has $24 million in debts to the state, due to payments made by the Finance Ministry, which the Americans undertook; if the debts are converted into shares, the state could become main shareholder again," Musetescu yesterday said.
The Privatisation minister deemed Resita-based plant's privatisation as a "a very complicate" one, as the contract has "very few clear stipulations."
He explained that the failure to observe any of the provisions would not result into a termination of the contract, but into a lawsuit in order to find a solution.
"We reserve the right to use any legal means available to us, and, if there aren't any, we will have them created for us, to have this situation go back to normal," Musetescu said.
The Privatisation minister yesterday was supposed to meet with a representative of the United States Embassy in Bucharest.
An attempt to bring the two parties involved (the unionists at Resita and the American administrator Michael McNutt) together for negotiations is scheduled for today. The minister said he was willing to go to Resita.
The unionists at CSR yesterday announced they would resort to an extreme solution, that is banning the Noble Ventures representatives from the company.
The Privatisation minister yesterday questioned the American company's intention to make the investments included in the contract, which have a new deadline for completion set for August, wondering about the American management's lack of interest in concluding the protocols with the Labour and Finance Ministries to have the plant's obligations to the state budget rescheduled.
Three weeks ago, the Government issued a decision striking off all the penalties collected since the privatisation and approved the rescheduling of the net debts over five years, with six months in grace period.
What should have been one of the largest American investments in Romania is gradually turning into a Tepro look-alike. The conflict between the union members at the Combinatul Siderurgic Resita (Resita Steel Mill -CSR) and the representatives of Noble Ventures, owner of the plant, is becoming increasingly serious.
All those talks the two parties had, either mediated by the authorities or not, have failed to produce a solution so far.
The union members demand that the production should be resumed, the salaries paid, and the American shareholder removed from the plant's management and have been protesting ever since mid January.
At the moment, some unionists are on hunger strike and threaten to block the European Road 70 and the railway.
The Caras-Severin County prefect, Gheorghe Pavel Balan, yesterday said that both the Prefect's Office and the Government fully agreed with the claims of the CSR employees about salary payment and production resumption, but could not possibly agree with the request of the Vatra union about removing the American shareholder and appointing another management for the plant, the Mediafax correspondent reports.
The Prefect feels the unionists' accusations against the Government are ungrounded, as constant efforts have been made to have the matter cleared up and the employer now has every single incentive requested.
Balan also said he had not been able to reach the representatives of the majority stockholder of CSR, the Noble Ventures Company, ever since June 12, as they had practically cut off any communication with local authorities.
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