Raiffeisen Investment Polska still ahead in the race to buy ET's El-Net

No company has obtained exclusive rights to negotiate the takeover of Elektrim Telekomunikacje's El-Net phone operator. Later today, one of the four parties interested in the purchase, Raiffeisen Investment Polska (RIP), is meeting El-Net board members and representatives of the banks involved in financing its activity. RIP hopes to secure more time, presumably till end of January 2004, to shape the purchase agreement. The company is supported by BRE Bank, El-Net's main creditor, against Netia, which has already made a final offer to buy El-Net. The representatives of the Finnish giant recently refuted an article published in Rzeczpospolita that it only intended to buy El-Net and drive it to bankruptcy. "It's not true" said Jolanta Ciesielska from Netia, "We are a sector investor interested in acquiring the whole of El-net. Our overall goal is to consolidate the market," she added. (Puls Biznesu, p. 8; Parkiet, p. 5) M.K.