TAIPED will be the basis for the new guarantee
fund for state asset privatizations as agreed on Monday at the eurozone
summit meeting in Brussels. The aim is to beef up the existing sell-off
fund with assets that will generate revenues of 50 billion euros in the
long term (estimated at between 30 and 35 years).
Neither the government nor TAIPED appeared prepared for such a
development. Some talks had taken place over the last few days regarding
what assets could be included in the portfolio of the new fund. Besides
those already known (the state’s shares in OTE telecom, public real
estate), the discussions also included energy reserves, state holdings
in systemic banks, other bank assets and properties belonging to social
security funds.
All this will lead to the creation of a “hyperfund” that will
undertake TAIPED’s role, as well as the activities of the Hellenic
Financial Stability Fund (HFSF), the Environment and Energy Ministry as
far as energy reserves are concerned, and the property assets of the
pension funds.
This generates genuine hope that the long-term 50-billion-euro target
can be achieved. The eurozone summit’s decision provides for 50 percent
of that to cover the loans for the recapitalization of the banking
sector, 25 percent will be used to service the public debt, and the
remaining 25 percent will go toward the country’s growth, upon the
insistence of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.
The new TAIPED will be institutionally upgraded so that it will be
shielded from any political or governmental interference. While this had
been the original plan for TAIPED, in practice all of its decisions
were made by the government. Another objective is for the new fund to be
monitored by the representatives of the country’s creditors, but it is
not known how that will be conducted. A new governing board will also be
appointed or voted in to run the new fund. The idea is for the
political affiliations of board members to be more varied than is the
case today.
While the parliamentary voting on the TAIPED upgrade is not among the
prior actions required this week, it is certain that it will go through
the House sooner or later this summer, and definitely before the
signing of the third bailout agreement.
(ekathimerini.com)