By A. Tsiblakis & L. Karageorgos
The first and most pressing priority on the agenda of new Shipping and Island Policy Minister Panayiotis Kouroumblis is to complete an international tender for the sale of a majority stake and the management of the Thessaloniki Port Authority (OL.Th).
Kouroumblis, a visually impaired attorney who joined the leftist SYRIZA camp after decades as a socialist PASOK lawmaker, swapped the health portfolio for the shipping ministry as a result of a Cabinet reshuffle on Friday.
He takes over from Thodoris Dritsas, a diehard leftist who on many occasions reiterated his opposition to the government’s landmark privatization: the sale of a majority stake of the Piraeus Port Authority (OLP) to Chinese multinational Cosco.
The OLP privatization had been spearheaded by the previous government and generated extreme opposition by the current ruling party at the time.
Dritsas, in fact, initially called for a cancellation of the tender when he assumed the ministry's helm in January 2015 and even wanted to renegotiate the concession for the container terminal in Piraeus, which was already under Cosco’s management.
Completion of the tender to sell 67 percent of the Thessaloniki Port Authority is expected to be concluded in February 2017, based on the current timetable. Several delays have already plagued the tender.
One of the pending issues is the level of investment a new concessionaire will be obliged to make, with previous figures of between 300 to 350 million euros now giving way to a number as low as 180 million euros, a figure cited by Greek PM Alexis Tsipras recently.
Nevertheless, at least two candidates have signaled that capital investments at the port cannot 120 million euros, as least under the current economic conditions. Instead, candidates are calling the prospect of pumping 180 million euros into the port over a 10-year or more period.
If the tender for the port of Thessaloniki materializes without a hitch, next up for possible privatization are 11 regional port authorities around the country.
