October 15 (SeeNews) - The privatisation of Romanian rail freight carrier CFR Marfa will be relaunched after the buyer, local privately-held railway operator Grup Feroviar Roman (GFR), has failed to pay the price by the Monday deadline, transport minister Ramona Manescu said.
"Today, as you know, the 60 day deadline by which GFR could pay expired [...] GFR has not paid," Manescu told a news conference late on Monday.
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GFR was declared winner of CFR Marfa's privatisation tender in June after filing the only binding offer for a 51% stake in the company, of 904.98 million lei ($275 million/202.8 million euro). GFR pledged to invest a further 900 million lei in the struggling rail freight carrier.
The privatisation contract was signed on September 2. GFR, which had already paid 30 million euro for the acquisition, had to come up with the rest of the money by October 14.
The owner of GFR, Gruia Stoica, said on Monday he was invited at the transport ministry to be informed that he could not make the payment as the seller had not met some conditions envisaged in the privatisation contract.
CFR Marfa, wholly-owned by the state, expects a gross loss of 211 million lei for this year, according to its 2013 business plan.
Romania has pledged to privatise the debt-ridden carrier this year under a deal with the International Monetary Fund.
( 1 euro= 4.4601 Romanian lei)