Sources inform ''Globes'' that Eilat Port Company Ltd. employees want 15% of the company when it is privatized. The benefit is worth an estimated NIS 20 million, on the basis of the 2008 valuation of the port. The employees raised their demand at a meeting with the Histadrut (General Federation of Labor in Israel), Ministry of Finance, and Government Companies Authority last week.
In May 2009, the cabinet decided to make the first stage in the privatization of Ashdod Port Company Ltd. and Haifa Port Company Ltd. in 2010, selling 15% of each company through an offer to sell or a combined offer to sell and financing round. Later, the ministerial privatization committee set February 17 as the deadline for this step, but it is now clear that it will not happen before the end of the year.
Under the ports reform agreement signed between the Ministry of Finance, the Histadrut, and the ports' workers in 2005, the ports' workers would have the right to buy 10% of the shares issued - 1.5% of each port's share capital - at a 30% discount.
The cabinet did not decide how to privatize the Eilat Port. However, the Ministry of Finance is apparently planning to sell the Eilat Port Company's shares to a private party, with a preference for a port operating company. The privatized company will receive a 15-year franchise to operate the port's wharfs. The 2008 valuation valued this franchise at NIS 140 million.
Transport Workers Union chairman Avi Edry told "Globes" today that it was a good thing for the port workers to own shares. "I think that employees should be given ownership in the companies because it's said that an employee who has ownership takes better care of the company and is connected to what happens in it."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on February 8, 2010
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