Workers at state-run shipyard protest privatization

Also Thursday, workers in the Transylvanian city of Sighisoara, 250 kilometers (156 miles) north of Bucharest, went on strike to demand higher wages and protest a management decision to increase the workload by 20 percent. Some 300 workers at the Shipyard Severnav in Drobeta Turnu Severin, a Danube port located 275 kilometers (170 miles) west of Bucharest, blocked a major highway linking Romania to Yugoslavia, the private news agency AM press reported. A woman and a child were reported injured after being hit by a car trying to smash through the roadblock. They were taken to a hospital with minor injuries.

Barbu Castena, the head of the local workers' union, declared he would go on hunger strike in front of the Bucharest office of the State Ownership Fund, the agency in charge of privatizing state companies. There are several bidders for the shipyard, according to Radu Sarbu, head of the State Ownership Fund. He said any privatization contract would protect workers and oblige the new owners to modernize the shipyard. The workers claim that a small Romanian company with no experience in shipbuilding wants to buy the shipyard and they fear they will be laid off by the new owner. The shipyard made a good profit last year. The State Ownership Fund was to make a decision later Thursday on the privatization of the shipyard. Parliament adopted a resolution calling for the dissolution of the State Ownership Fund following a report that the agency had violated bidding laws. The International Monetary Fund last month also criticized the Romanian government for moving too slowly on selling off state companies. The IMF's board was expected to discuss granting Romania another installment of a dlrs 540 million loan in late October or early November.

(sda)