Oana Gheorghiu announces the start of the reform in state companies. “I don't promise overnight miracles, I promise a rigorous, predictable, transparent and verifiable process”
Deputy Prime Minister Oana Gheorghiu announced on Sunday that next week “the final decision will be made, according to the established methodology, regarding the list of the first 10 energy and transport companies” that will enter the reform process. “And we start concrete work with them,” added the deputy prime minister.
Oana Gheorghiu wrote a post on Facebook on Sunday, one month after becoming deputy prime minister, during which she says she focused on laying “the solid foundations of the mandate, using what I have learned in all the years of work: strategic thinking, team building and proper planning”.
“The priority was to understand the system and the sources of blockages, to build a professional way of working, together with the Government teams, regardless of the political color, and, based on them, to formulate the strategic vision for my fields of activity”, added Oana Gheorghiu.
What he said about the reform of state companies
The Deputy Prime Minister declared that “strategic approach and not heirupism is the one that will give results”.
“Romania has over 1,500 state-owned companies. Some are vital. Others have been consuming public money, without results, for years, which has a negative impact on the economy and society,” continued Oana Gheorgiu.
She warned that “Romania cannot afford to continue with these losses.”
“However, it is important not only to stop waste, but to find efficiency solutions that also take into account the needs of people who now work in loss-making companies and that lead to the economic and social development of the communities in which they are located. Only in this way can the respective communities reinvent themselves, and people can build a decent living that is sustainable in the long term,” added the deputy prime minister.
Oana Gheorghiu claims that in the first month of her mandate she “focused on three priorities”, finalizing the “reform strategy of state companies, which defines the objectives and work methodology” and which she presented to “the ministers responsible for the fields in which these entities operate”.
“Together with the ministries and the General Secretariat of the Government, we have set up well-defined teams with clear and assumed responsibilities for governance, restructuring and data. Each ministry has nominated 3 people who will be responsible for the reform of state companies in their field, and at the SGG level, the team that worked on the preparation of the regulations on corporate governance in public enterprises will now also be involved in the implementation of these regulations and the reform”, Oana Gheorghiu said.
“From next week we enter the actual pillar of the reform”
Gheorghiu said that the strategy was agreed with the country's institutions and “was the basis of the information submitted to the European Commission by Minister Dragoș Pîslaru, in which the new working model is presented that offers solid premises for reaching the targets regarding the reform of state companies and the elimination of interims from the Boards of Directors”.
“From next week we enter the actual pilot of the reform: the ministries have sent their proposals, and next week we will make the final decision, according to the established methodology, regarding the list of the first 10 companies in energy and transport, which enter the reform process, and we start the concrete work with them. I do not promise miracles overnight, I promise a rigorous, predictable, transparent and verifiable process”, said Oana Gheorghiu.
The deputy prime minister believes that “the stake goes beyond the reform of state companies”.
“Its success means not only the repair of a part of the state, but the beginning of the change in the way Romania works. This reform is a test of institutional maturity: can the Romanian state work in a coordinated manner, with discipline and responsibility? If the answer is yes, then we are not only transforming public companies, but also the way in which the administration makes decisions, manages public money and assumes results. This is, in fact, the stake of my mandate: to demonstrate, together, that Romania can move from improvisation to professional governance”, Oana Gheorghiu also declared.
