Albpetrol sale postponed
02/11/2012

The Ministry of Economy was unable to sign within the legal deadline the agreement for the Albpetrol Company.

Top Channel learned that the winning company, Vetro Energy, asked the Ministry to postpone the negotiations with 30 days, and the government accepted. The final deadline set by the government for signing the agreement was 30 days after the winner was declared.

Within this deadline, the company should pay 20% of the price otherwise the government would start negotiating with the second company. The official decision for the winner was declared by the Council of Ministers on October 3rd, and according to this rule, the agreement should have been signed this Friday.

But this didn’t happen. The Company used a legal gap in the government decision. Article 3.2 of this regulation says that the deadline can be postponed with 30 days if both parties agree. The entire process for the sale of the Albpetrol Company is still covered by mystery, and the procedures are held in full confidentiality.

Since when the negotiations started, the Ministry of Economy did not publish any detail of the negotiations and neither the motivation. But non official sources say that the main cause is related with the guarantee payment. According to the government decision, 30 days after the winner will be declared, the winning company should pay 20% of the tender value, 170 million EUR on this case, and the money should come from one of best 50 banks in the world.

Confidential sources say that this matter is not closed yet and they are negotiating, which could leave room for suspicions or speculation on the success of the tender, on which the government has hung its hopes for the budget and public finance problems.