ZAGREB, Jan 24 (Hina) - A bill on Croatian Radio and Television (HRT), the privatisation of Excelsior hotel, and the annulment of ownership transformation in the Rijeka Harbour company were some of the questions lower house MPs put to
members of the government on Wednesday. Ante Kovacevic of the Croatian Christian Democratic Union inquired if in line with a new HRT bill, the government would have direct management of HRT. Prime Minister Ivica Racan said HRT would have a council comprising representatives of 16 associations, the list of which will be available to the public. Kovacevic also asserted that "Croatia has half a million unemployed people (and that) the American Bechtel company exploits Croatia's poor," to which Racan responded by saying that the unemployed figure was exaggerated. He reminded it had been the former government which signed a bad contract with Bechtel for the construction of
ZAGREB, Jan 24 (Hina) - A bill on Croatian Radio and Television
(HRT), the privatisation of Excelsior hotel, and the annulment of
ownership transformation in the Rijeka Harbour company were some of
the questions lower house MPs put to members of the government on
Wednesday.
Ante Kovacevic of the Croatian Christian Democratic Union inquired
if in line with a new HRT bill, the government would have direct
management of HRT. Prime Minister Ivica Racan said HRT would have a
council comprising representatives of 16 associations, the list of
which will be available to the public.
Kovacevic also asserted that "Croatia has half a million unemployed
people (and that) the American Bechtel company exploits Croatia's
poor," to which Racan responded by saying that the unemployed
figure was exaggerated. He reminded it had been the former
government which signed a bad contract with Bechtel for the
construction of a power plant near Zagreb, and that the incumbent
one had a hard time revising it.
Marin Jurjevic of the Social Democratic Party inquired about the
Rijeka Harbour company, to which Deputy Prime Minister Slavko Linic
answered that its ownership transformation, unfair to the
employees, could have been settled through the further
privatisation of the state portfolio.
The intention was to compensate the employees by enabling them to
take part in the privatisation of other state-owned companies.
Linic said the government had succeeded in consolidating the
harbour, but added the annulment of ownership transformation would
bring back all the debts the company had before.
Dubravka Suica of the Croatian Democratic Union inquired how the
Croatian Privatisation Fund could sell the Otok zivota maritime
demesne with the Excelsior hotel in the southern Adriatic port of
Dubrovnik. Linic said the fund did not sell property but a company,
reminding that the hotel owns part of Otok zivota. Only the owner
was changed with the sale, it is no longer the state but a private
enterprise from London, the deputy premier said, adding that no
illegal acts had been committed.
(hina) ha