The bill titled 'Privatisations Law 2014' is considered as a precondition for the disbursement of the next tranche of the €10 billion financial assistance package granted to Cyprus and will be discussed in the next Eurogroup meeting scheduled for March 10. Privatisations, considered an integral part of the Memorandum of Understanding on the conditions of the financial assistance, with a view of generating state revenue of €1.4 billion by 2018. According to the bill, the Council of Ministers can issue decrees for the selling of state-owned organizations.

Under the bill, the Council will appoint a Ministerial Committee chaired by the Finance Minister and comprising "at least four Ministers" to supervise the procedure and to provide guidance to the Privatisations Unit and the Privatisations Commissioner with a four-year mandate. Privatisations can be implemented "with methods that are acceptable in normal commercial practices including the sale, transfer, lease or the granting of the right of use, management or exploitation of movable or immovable property." The bill notes that "proceeds from privatizations will be deposited in state coffers and will emerge from the private sector, either from within or outside the Republic or by other state funds outside the Republic."

The bill follows a detailed road map approved by the Council of Ministers last December covering the privatization of Cyprus Telecommunications Agency (Cyta) and the Cyprus Port Authority by the end of 2015 and the selling of Electricity Authority of Cyprus by the September 2017, as well a divestment in four other organizations. For Cyta, the plan envisages the participation of its employees either individually or collectively with percentage to be decided by March 2015 and then it will be offered to a strategic investor by the end of 2015. In response to the bill, employees of Electricity Authority announced that tomorrow will go on a twelve hour strike, leaving skeleton staff to ensure EAC operation. However, a trade union leader said that power cuts cannot be excluded.

Source: Famagusta Gazette