The State Property Fund is lobbying for a shareholders' meeting of NPK "Halychyna." It will take place on February 28. At the meeting, the SPF hopes to receive dividends on the state's 25% stake. "At all enterprises where the state has 1%, 5%, or 20%, we will force them to pay dividends," explains SPF head Valentyna Semeniuk.
Recall that until recently, the largest shareholders of NPK were People's Deputy Ihor Yeremieiev, the "Pryvat" group, and the state. The last shareholders' meeting of NPK "Halychyna" was held in 2001. People's Deputy Ihor Yeremieiev, who controls about 41% of NPK "Halychyna" shares, had the full legal right to block the holding of a shareholders' meeting. It was not in his interest to hold a shareholders' meeting, since his structures fully controlled the enterprise's cash flows. The "Pryvat" group is negotiating with Ihor Yeremieiev to buy out his stake, but there is no official confirmation of the transaction having been completed.
At the State Property Fund last Saturday, a working meeting was held with some of the company's shareholders, after which Valentyna Semeniuk stated that there is now every reason to believe that the meeting will take place. "Relevant negotiations were held with the shareholders. Yeremieiev said he will come. There is hope that there will be a quorum," Semeniuk stated. According to the head of the SPF, negotiations were also held with the enterprise's minority shareholders.
Responding to a question about whether she knew anything about Yeremieiev selling his stake in NPK "Halychyna," Semeniuk replied that only at the meeting will it become clear "who owns what and who sold what to whom."
The Securities Commission plans to send its representative to monitor the registration of shareholders by NPK "Halychyna's" registrar — the firm "Reiestrator" from Lutsk.
The fact that the meeting is being held on February 28 may indicate that Ihor Yeremieiev sold his stake to the "Pryvat" group. After all, the meeting may adopt not only a decision on dividend payment but also on the rotation of the company's top management.
If the shareholders' meeting is once again disrupted, the SPF may resort to harsh blackmail of the company's shareholders: for example, government officials may once again revisit the issue of returning the 30% stake in "Halychyna" to state ownership due to failure to fulfill investment obligations. "We will look for other ways if the meeting does not take place," says Semeniuk. "The owners have pulled everything out of the plant that could be pulled out, and moreover they invested nothing," said Volodymyr Zinevych, director of the department of oil, gas, and oil refining industry at the Ministry of Fuel and Energy. According to him, at the time of privatization, about $250 million was needed to modernize the plant. Now, however, replacing the enterprise's worn-out equipment could cost several times more — "about a billion dollars."
Published in the newspaper "DELO" No. 86 of February 27, 2006.