BULGARIA Air is to be the first company in the transport sector to be offered up for privatisation by the new Government. The draft for the strategy of its sale would be started in October, said Transport Minister Petar Moutafchiev at a news conference on September 17.
The previous government proposed to fully privatise the airline, but Parliament did not get around to approving the strategy.

Concerning the national maritime fleet, Navigation Maritime Bulgare (Navibulgare), Moutafchiev said that it was not yet clear as to whether it would be sold as a single entity or in self-contained parts. He said the Cabinet would not rush ahead with the privatisation of the fleet and that the sell-off strategy for the company would be ready in 2006. The economy and transport policy committees of the previous Parliament, but not the MPs themselves, had approved a sell-off strategy that called for a 30-per-cent stake in Navibulgare to be offered publicly.

Regarding the railways, the Transport Ministry was considering a merger between the Bulgarian State Railways (BDZ) and the company that operates the domestic railway infrastructure to form a railway holding or consortium, said Deputy Transport Minister Georgi Petarneichev. He did not commit to a specific timetable, but said that the goal was to bolster the market share of railway transport.

Within the holding structure passenger and cargo transportation, and possibly engine maintenance, would be split into separate divisions. Mutafchiev called the decision made in 2002 to split the BDZ into two separate companies – one managing the railway infrastructure and another providing railway haulage-a mistake. The infrastructure operator relies mainly on BDZ for revenues because, of the three private companies licensed to compete with the national carrier, only one is conducting business. BDZ owes the operator about 50 million leva in fees for the use of the railway infrastructure.

Working out a new national transport scheme connecting different types of transport is also among the key priorities of Moutafchiev and his team. The scheme envisages the enhancement of the quality of transport services. Safety, security and the modernisation of the transport system are the other focal points of the ministry’s work.

“We will try to speed up the implementation of projects financed by the European Union pre-accession funds,” Moutafchiev said. A separate safety and technical supervision directorate at the ministry will be set up, as well as special units to investigate water and rail transport accidents.

The upgrade of the transport system will be achieved mainly through the improvement of the infrastructure. The state will first define the priorities clearly, and then the support of private investors will be brought in to play.