Back in April of this year, right after the so-called privatization of the port of Thessaloniki was announced, I wrote a very critical article about the transaction ("Thessaloniki's private equity port"). My conclusion at the time was that "The Deutsche Invest consortium seems to be the prototype of the foreign investor that Greece should stay away from."
For reasons unknown to me, this subject never really made the headlines. Nevermind that at issue was/is Greece's second largest port and gateway to South-Eastern Europe; nevermind that SYRIZA had for years blocked privatization of this port; nevermind that Greece's conduct versus foreign investors is a much-observed subject --- the deal was declared successful and it was closed. End of story.
So much more was I surprised when no one less than the American ambassador to Greece now raised the subject publicly. In a speech at the American-Hellenic Chamber of Commerce on December 4, Ambassador Geoffrey R. Pyatt made the following statement: "We have seen the difficulties privatization faces in Greece, as in the Thessaloniki port, where it’s unclear who the private investors actually are and where their money comes from."
When an American ambassador says something like the above publicly in his host country about certain policies of his host country, one can undoubtedly consider it a bombshell. It will be interesting to see if this bombshell now makes the headlines or not.
PS: a Greek friend of mine gave me the following, albeit not very sophisticated, analysis of the transaction: "Someone needs to know something about running a port (the French), someone needs to figure out who needs to be bribed (Savvidis) and someone needs to provide the money for the bribes (the Germans)."
For reasons unknown to me, this subject never really made the headlines. Nevermind that at issue was/is Greece's second largest port and gateway to South-Eastern Europe; nevermind that SYRIZA had for years blocked privatization of this port; nevermind that Greece's conduct versus foreign investors is a much-observed subject --- the deal was declared successful and it was closed. End of story.
So much more was I surprised when no one less than the American ambassador to Greece now raised the subject publicly. In a speech at the American-Hellenic Chamber of Commerce on December 4, Ambassador Geoffrey R. Pyatt made the following statement: "We have seen the difficulties privatization faces in Greece, as in the Thessaloniki port, where it’s unclear who the private investors actually are and where their money comes from."
When an American ambassador says something like the above publicly in his host country about certain policies of his host country, one can undoubtedly consider it a bombshell. It will be interesting to see if this bombshell now makes the headlines or not.
PS: a Greek friend of mine gave me the following, albeit not very sophisticated, analysis of the transaction: "Someone needs to know something about running a port (the French), someone needs to figure out who needs to be bribed (Savvidis) and someone needs to provide the money for the bribes (the Germans)."
Well, apparently the bomb went off, the bank issuing the Letter of Credit for the consortium has gone under some sort of administration. Congratulations to ambassador Pyatt for having a fine nose.
ReplyDeleteLennard
I had no idea that the bank backing the deal would come from Russia. That has got to be the first time in the Western world of privatizations that a Russian bank (instead of a typical global player) would back a deal of this magnitude, particularly when the only Russian connection is an alleged minority investor. For the Greek privatization agency to accept such a bank is an embarrassment. We'll see how they get out of this bind.
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