Prosecutors are looking into the management of six state-owned companies

The Minister of Economy, Digitalization, Entrepreneurship and Tourism, Radu Miruţă, launched serious accusations yesterday regarding the way in which the members of the boards of directors of state-owned companies were selected, after the Control Body discovered irregularities in six of them.

Radu Miruţă stated: "Six state-owned companies were checked and it was found that the entire process of selecting members of the board of directors was flawed by a procedure built over 8 years, through which ministry employees demonstrated their "competence” in personal interest, trampling on the interests of state-owned companies.”

The Minister of Economy stated that during the checks, "illegal orders and appointments made intentionally based on an expired law” were found, and administrative acts were signed at the ministry level that were based on repealed provisions. "Laws that were no longer valid were applied, precisely to facilitate the implantation of people in the boards of directors of the six state-owned companies, bypassing possible obstacles,” added Radu Miruţă.

Based on the report of the Control Body, received on Wednesday evening, the Minister of Economy ordered the first disciplinary measures.

"I have ordered that two people from the management of the department responsible for coordinating state-owned companies be subject to disciplinary investigation. The aspects presented have a criminal dimension," emphasized Radu Miruţă, who added that, due to the seriousness of the situation discovered at the six companies, he ordered the expansion of the investigations.

"Noticing that the same problem appeared in all 6 companies checked, I ordered the expansion of the checks to all state-owned companies subordinated to the Ministry of Economy. I expect that irregularities will be discovered there as well and I will draw up a final package that I will submit to the Prosecutor's Office. This is only the first stage," warned Minister Radu Miruţă.

Among the companies where irregularities have already been detected are IAR, IOR, Avioane Craiova, Iprochim and Şantierul Naval 2 Mai (an economic unit about which the BURSA newspaper published an article that raised several questions regarding its management and the way in which state representatives act).

"Our goal is to recover everything that was lost, because the concern of some people there was not the salary, but influencing the decision", said Minister Radu Miruţă.

In his view, for these situations to not happen again, courageous legislative changes are needed.

"I saw that SGG put forward proposals to amend Ordinance 109 in public debate, but the proposed amendments are eye candy. They do not solve the problems that led to this. Therefore, the Ministry of Economy sent SGG its own proposal, with the expansion of performance criteria, evaluation every 6 months, reduction of the number of members of the boards of directors and independent evaluations for strategic companies, outside the ministry, which will be validated by the specialized committees in Parliament", mentioned Radu Miruţă.

The Minister of Economy explained that he also requested "clarification of the procedure for canceling selections where defects are found”, emphasizing that "we cannot rebuild economically on a quagmire”.

In parallel, the Ministry of Economy opened, just this week, a new way for professionals to apply for management of state-owned companies.

"On the first page of the ministry's website there is now a button through which interested persons can upload their CV to apply for management positions or as special administrators in companies in insolvency. In just a few hours, 16 CVs were received from people with a higher professional quality than those currently in the verified state-owned companies”, Minister Miruţă stated.

He specified that he ordered all of these above measures because the situation of state-owned companies remains alarming.

Radu Miruţă stated: "There are companies that follow a clear path: from profit to loss, insolvency and then bankruptcy. The interest of some is that these companies go bankrupt because they compete with others or because they own land that can be transformed into real estate complexes on the street.”

To combat the phenomenon, the Ministry of Economy has created a mechanism through which anyone can send information about irregularities , which are centralized by the Control Body and transformed into weekly reports. "We will probably receive hundreds or even thousands of notifications. Not all of them will lead to control reports, but we will prioritize them according to the evidence and information received,” the minister said.

Finally, Radu Miruţă expressed his reservations regarding the reform of AMEPIP, an institution undergoing reorganization and involved in legislative proposals. "I have questions about the real concern to solve the problems in state-owned companies,” he pointed out, leaving an alarm signal open on the fact that the network of interests that has held state-owned companies captive for several years could resist even in the face of cosmetic reforms.