Agro Perspectiva

Abromavicius: Government modifies procedure to appoint chairmen of large public companies

15.01.2015 10:17 "Agro Perspectiva" (Kyiv) — The Ukrainian Government changed a procedure to appoint administrative staff of large state-owned companies, thus to provide a transparent and professional approach to this issue, Government Portal says referring to the Ukrainian Minister of Economic Development and Trade Aivaras Abromavicius report made at the Government House briefing on Jan 14. «Today, with a decree of the Cabinet, we have changed a procedure to appoint chairmen of major large state-owned enterprises,» the Minister told. As to the Minister, in order to introduce this innovation all 3374 public sector entities will be divided into two parts: large companies (which are over 60 in number), and all the rest. «A large company is defined as that having assets worth over UAH2 milliard or having turnover exceeding UAH1.5 milliard. Presently we enumerate over 60 such companies,» Abromavicius said. As to the report, for these 60 companies a relevant Ministry in synergy with certain independent commissions will be selecting the candidates. Aivaras Abromavicius noted that there would be applied the experience of the Infrastructure Ministry, which had already placed on its website an announcement on the selection candidates for the posts of Directors General of Ukrzaliznytsia and the Boryspil airport — they had received respectively about 200 and 100 applications. «This project is based on a transparent system, which implies that the independent experts are to select the best candidates (from 2 to 5) and then recommend them to the Nomination Committee,» the Minister explained. Abromavicius added the Nomination Committee will consist of 5 Ministers: «of economy, finance, infrastructure, coal industry and agricultural policy». The remaining 5 members of the Committee shall be independent experts. «This Commission will choose one candidate and propose him/her during a Cabinet’s session, as justthe Government will approve the heads of key state enterprises,» Abromavicius said. It is to be admitted, the Minister stressed that these are just the first steps to improve corporate governance. In the future, he said, all companies are to be corporatized, following the western standards of such management — that is, establishing of supervisory boards and independent directors institution. He expressed belief that «the Nomination Committee will further approve independent members of the supervisory boards of the mentioned companies.» «There is a number of applicants to assume the posts of directors of key companies, so we should approach it with professionalism and transparency. We will consider everything in public,» Abromavicius said.