Who Owned Georgia English.pdf

On December 24th, the economy ministry reported theKazakhs were out of the picture, while on January 11th, PrimeMinister Zurab Zhvania announced the Czech and Kazakhproposals had been rejected and the remaining three partieswere invited for individual negotiations. Zhvania also said,“The Austrian company has even made a USD 10 million downpayment in an attempt to demonstrate its serious intentions overthis deal.” The new closing date was slated for January 18th. 347The three companies initially submitted separate bids, butEvrAzHolding and «DMC Ferro» decided to re-apply with a jointbid and won the tender for $132 million. EvrAz Holding wonthe bid, even though economy minister, Aleksi Alexishvili, saidthe Ukrainian Interpipe Corp had submitted the «better» bid.Interpipe offered $117 million for Chiaturmanganumi/Vartsikheand pledged to invest $60 million into the enterprises withinthree years. Interpipe Corp was owned by Viktor Pinchuk, theson-in-law of former Ukrainian President, Vladimir Kuchma. 348Georgian officials, including State Minister for EconomicReform at the time, Kakha Bendukidze, said they decided againstInterpipe because the Ukrainian company had allegedly urgedthe government to also let it take control of Zestaponi Fero-Alloy Plant, a property owned by DCM-Ferro. In response toBendukidze’s accusation of «banditry,» Interpipe charged thatGeorgia’s privatization campaign was «a vague process with norules.» 349“Until 6 PM on January 18, we knew that Interpipe andRussian Evrazholding were leaders (in the bid), but a half anhour later, Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania informed the publicabout the submission of a new proposal. After this, we refusedto participate in such a privatization process. ... Unlike othercompanies that only included prices in their proposals, we347 Ibid348 Interpipe Talks about Incorrect Privatisation. Civil Georgia. January 19, 2005http://www.civil.ge/geo/article.php?id=8636349 Georgia Votes in New Government. John Mackedon Eurasianet http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav021705.shtml Accessed on04/12/201286