The Guardian — Privatisations have been at the heart of Greece’s rescue programmes, but from the start have been riven by discord and problem-plagued. Since being first bailed out to the tune of €110bn in mid-2010 in what was then the biggest financial rescue in global history, Athens has raised only €3.5bn from asset sales – a far cry from the original target of €50bn set by creditors.
Ideological resistance, lack of investor interest and bureaucratic obstacles have been mostly to blame. Pitsiorlas, the fund’s sixth chairman, could be the man to reverse that process. Last week he predicted that the sale of Greece’s biggest piece of real estate at Athens’ erstwhile Hellenikon airport would be concluded in June, boosting proceeds from state sales this year to more than €2bn.
By 2018, he reckons asset-stripping could bring in €6bn. After initially opposing the sale of the country’s two main ports – in Piraeus and the northern city of Thessaloniki – the Tsipras government relaunched tenders after the terms of a €86bn bailout, Greece’s third, were finally agreed last August.
In April it approved a bid by the Chinese shipping giant Cosco to buy a 67% stake in Piraeus. The German transport operator Fraport has similarly won a bid to operate 14 regional airports – including those on popular tourist destinations such as Mykonos, Santorini and Corfu – for the next 50 years. “The state of our airports on islands like Santorini are a national embarrassment,” says Pitsiorlas. “So why not improve them? They are not going to own them forever and when they come back to us they will be in much better condition.”
The straight-talking privatisation chief has won plaudits from unlikely places. “If [prime minister Alexis] Tsipras wants to survive politically and make the definitive U-turn to the centre left, he has to speak the language of business, investment, growth and extroversion,” says Dimitris Kerides, who teaches political science at Athens’ Panteion University and has close ties with the main opposition centre-right New Democracy party.
“Pitsiorlas is business-friendly. He is capable and confident. He is regarded as the best of the best on the left by the right.”
The fund, which will also encompass public corporations and publicly owned bank stocks, is aimed at facilitating privatisations by allowing sales of real estate to proceed without ministers fearing accusations of fraud.
More than 500 islands, and large tracts of Greece’s pristine, 16,000km-long coastline are on the list of assets Athens is under immense pressure to offload. The catalogue also includes, boutique hotels, golf courses, Olympic venues and historic properties in Plaka in hills next to the Acropolis, with the full details to be revealed in the next few months.
But the overarching fear is that the government is about to embark on a firesale of the family silver at rock-bottom prices. Pitsiorlas fiercely rejects any such notion, saying public utilities such as the water board will not be denationalised. “There are a lot of misunderstandings and misconceptions. For instance, we have hotels on our books that have been confiscated by banks. Why should the state be a hotelier?” he asked.
“In the same vein, why should the state pay thousands of euros in rent every year for the hangars that house two airbuses that will never fly? We need to get out of the place we are in. Last week’s agreement offers a ray of hope but we have to run fast and make the changes that need to be made quickly.”
