Cyprus aims to launch the privatisation process for state telecoms company Cyta by May in inviting potential bidders to submit non-binding expressions of interest, the island’s privatisation commissioner said on Friday.
Commissioner Constantinos Herodotou told a business conference
the target date for the completion of the process, which will be in three phases, was the end of 2015.
“Our aim is to launch the transaction around the end of April or May this year,” Herodotou said.
Privatisations were a requirement of international lenders, which bailed Cyprus out with a deal to provide 10 billion euros of aid to the Mediterranean island in 2013.
Herodotou said the electricity authority of Cyprus was also up for privatisation, but with a target date the end of 2017. Cyta was more prepared to find a strategic partner because it has already been competing with the private sector for several years, he said.
Other utilities up for privatisation under Herodotou’s remit were the national lottery, the Cyprus Stock Exchange, the Cyprus petroleum storage company which was mainly real estate, and other tracts of property belonging to the state, he said.