Mykolayiv Alumina Again Taken Off Market

A week earlier, after a small battle between groups defending different interests, Verkhovna Rada voted to set up a committee of inquiry to study the situation at this enterprise. This time the debate was formally started by the State Property Fund announcing the sale of two share blocks of 17% and 13%. Inna Bohoslovska of the Greens (she had earlier carried out an audit at MAP) declared that Ukraine has never seen such expensive sales: $100 million + $30 million investment + $20 million worth of current assets.

The committee of inquiry will be made up of two NDP members, five Communists, and one Deputy from each of all the other factions. The committee is expected to submit its report before September 1, whereupon privatization may be resumed.

Executive branch representatives modestly declined comment, except SPF Deputy Head Yuri Hryshan, who told The Day that this is not the first time when the legislators have meddled in the privatization process, so selling anything is getting increasingly difficult.

PS: Word spread in the legislature's corridors that a 5% block of MAP shares, recently sold by SPF at the stock exchange to an unidentified person, has been pocketed by MAP manager Vitaly Meshyn through a businessman friend of his. Hearsay, of course.