Parliament okays privatization of Air Moldova, Codru hotel, its café
The Parliament adopted a bill on privatizing air carrier Air Moldova, the Codru hotel complex and its cafe, in the first reading on Thursday. The initiative belongs to four Communist parliamentarians and was supported only by their faction. The opposition factions harshly criticized the initiative and doubted whether the bill got enough ayes, Info-Prim Neo report.
The authors maintain that in most EU countries the air carriers, hotels and feeding entities are privately owned. “Taking into account the importance and the necessity of renewing the air sector and because the state does not have enough money for this purpose, it is necessary to make this updates by attracting private investments,” said Communist Anatol Zagorodnai. “The hotel networks are the business card of a country, but this sector is poorly developed in Moldova. The state owns some hotels, but can hardly afford renew them and ensure their high quality service,” he said.
Opposition MPs were surprised that the initiative does not come from the Government, but from parliamentarians. “In fact it is not the idea of those four MPs. They were just impelled to sign the bill,” Moldova Noastra Alliance's (AMN) Leonid Bujor said. “It is you who will be responsible at law for this illegality and not Voronin,” he predicted. He drew their attention that three of the Communist authors are young, as no experienced Communist MP ventured in this draft.
AMN deputy Alexandru Oleinic has warned that Air Moldova was nationalized in 2002 and is in a litigation considered by the ECHR. Oleinic opines it's not known who'll be held responsible in case the Government loses the suit. Another AMN deputy Ion Gutu has reminded that the Codru complex also comprises the State Residence the reparation of which cost 30 million lei from the national budget. Gutu says after privatizing the Parliament's Cafe, some 500 civil servants will have to find another place to eat in.
Social-Democrat president Dumitru Braghis says it's not the right time to privatize those. “We're witnessing a high-scale financial crisis. It's everything is bought at low costs in time of crises,” the MP said.
The draft has been hastily voted. Chair and deputy speaker Maria Postoico said the bill got the votes of most of MPs. Although the opposition questioned the vote, claiming many Communists refrained from voting, the draft was not subjected to a new vote.
The bill is to be considered in the second hearing two weeks later, on October 31.