Can state become good owner

The sell-off of state-owned enterprises is to be preferred to any other ideas for improving their management by the government. That emerged from a Pari daily’s inquiry among economists and business people about the government’s plans to set up an agency for management of state property. The state should become a good owner and wisely distribute the revenue from its property, finance minister Simeon Dyankov said recently. An analysis of the state assets is due by this week’s end. It will be used as a basis for the drafting a project for the establishment of the new agency. The document will be submitted to the council of ministers in mid-February, Dyankov said.
Obscurity
The ministries of economy and transport, which exercise the government’s shareholder control over the biggest state assets, told the Pari daily they have not been asked for a stand and do no participate in working groups on the issue. That is an initiative of the finance minister, the ministry of economy and energy said. What is known for now is that the companies with majority state interest will be run by the new agency. The state’s minority stakes will also be united and the dividends from them will go to a Silver Fund.
Control
The new agency should be controlled by the economy ministry, said economist Emil Harsev. Even now the ministry is in practice an agency for management of the state’s property. Deputy minister of transport Kamen Kichev in turn is categorical that the transport and communication companies should remain under the transport ministry’s control. A recent interview of prime minister Boyko Borisov for the Wall Street Journal, however, leaves no ground for speculation. We will increase the powers of finance minister Simeon Dyankov to gain bigger control of the economy, he said.
Pros & cons
The opinions voiced by Pari daily’s interviewees range from ‘an economic absurd’ to ‘a good first step’. Though there are examples of good management of state-owned enterprises in the world, the Bulgarian state has proven a poor owner, Bulgarian Industrial Association chairman Bozhidar Danev pointed out. A similar opinion was expressed by the chairman of the Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Tsvetan Simeonov. Uniting the state’s assets in an agency is better than the current situation, Institute for Market Economics’ Svetla Kostadinova said. According to Union of Democratic Forces leader Martin Dimitrov, such a step will not improve the transparency of the companies’ management. All, however, are unanimous that privatisation is the best solution.

Finance