PSEG to pay $25 million for Elektrownia Skawina stake

The Treasury and PSEG of the US are on Thursday expected to sign a conditional agreement on the privatization of power plant Elektrownia Skawina (ES). The American holding is said to have accepted the price of $24.8 million for a 35% stake and agreed to raise the company's capital by a further $7 million, giving it effective control over ES. The signing of an agreement has been postponed on a number of occasions over the past few months, as the two sides attempted to iron out the details of the sale. One sticking point was the term of guaranteed employment for the ES workers. Although a six-year period had been accepted by both the ES staff and the American investor, it was originally opposed by Treasury Minister Wieslaw Kaczmarek, who preferred just four years. Under the sale terms now agreed, PSEG will pay the workers a privatization bonus. The American investor is also committed to $56 million of investment in ES over the next eight years. (Prawo i Gospodarka, p. 4) M.K.