The Croatian government on Thursday accepted the screw factory DIV's offer for the purchase of 8,073,568 shares in the Brodosplit shipyard, with Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic saying that the decision was made after the assessment of risks and prospects.
"We have opted for DIV as we deem that it is a company and people who intend to be engaged in shipbuilding. It is also not irrelevant that this is a Croatian company," Milanovic said.
Ruling out speculations that ships would be built in the Split dock only for a short period only to be replaced with the construction of apartment blocks, the premier spoke about the importance of the maintenance of the shipbuilding industry in the region of Dalmatia.
Split has a long shipbuilding tradition that left its mark on the entire region in the last 100 years, and it is important to keep the shipbuilding industry as a relevant economic activity in this part of Croatia, Milanovic said underlining the importance of the preservation of the shipbuilding industry in Dalmatia both as tradition and as a source of earnings and profit.
The First Deputy Prime Minister and Economy Minister Radimir Cacic said that DIV had been developed into a big company with total revenues of EUR 60 million and profit of HRK 45 million last year.
According to the European Commission's estimates, DIV has demonstrated a proactive approach in the preparation of projects for the restructuring, Cacic added.
The process of privatisation in the next five years will not be a one-way street, as the government is taking over considerable obligations such as the payment of severance packages, and the covering of the losses incurred in the past. On the other hand, DIV undertakes to make the Split dock healthy again with investments of over two billion kuna, he said.
