As the date draws near for the auction to decide what players stay on the market until 2029, tension mounts among companies getting ready to participate in the contest and the special teams reviewing the documentation have bombarded the regulator with questions to make sure nothing is left unclear.
Two documents published on ANCOM’s web page show how thoroughly companies are preparing for the auction. They even asked how many wall outlets there are in the rooms and whether they may get food or documents delivered in the building. Judging from their questions, some of them are afraid they will be under secret surveillance throughout the auction.
Some operators feel the risk of such surveillance is so high that they would have liked to send in teams of experts to check if the place is clean. The worst fear of the telecoms during the auction is that someone might steal their secrets, as shown by the questions about whether they are allowed to leave someone behind to guard their rooms at night, even though they are inside an ANCOM building where everyone is checked at the entrance by military personnel. ANCOM flatly turned down both requests.
The auction that will decide what Romania’s communications market will look like until 2029 will take place at ANCOM’s Bucharest regional department building.
The institution’s chairman, Catalin Marinescu, told ZF in an interview last month that the operators would not be under surveillance in the rooms allocated to them for the duration of the auction.
“No, the representatives of the operators will not be audio or video taped in those offices. Yet since it’s important to have some proof for any such procedure, the common spaces will have video recordings made, but the offices made available to operators will not.”
The question that showed this might the case was one about legalization of documents by a country that is not party to the Hague Convention of 5 October 1961. The countries that did not join the Hague Convention abolishing the requirement of legalization of foreign public documents include Canada, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, Brazil and China.
There have been rumors about Chinese companies participating in the auction on the market, but so far no official confirmation of such intent has come. The rumors were fuelled by a statement made by Marius Fecioru in March 2012. He was secretary of state with the Communications Ministry at the time and said “China Mobile, AT&T, M3 Group and Telenor have shown interest in entering the market.”
On the other hand, Saudi Oger, which operated in Romania via Telemobil (Zapp), and now controls Euroweb via Turk Telekom, is controlled by the family of the former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri and is based in Saudi Arabia.
Marinescu also said in the interview that he could not make any forecasts, adding that several telecom auctions were scheduled for the end of the year in Europe, therefore operators would have several markets to choose from.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)