The Russian state is studying a proposal to sell off its 53% stake in state controlled telecommunications firm Rostelecom. The sale is said to be made to domestic rivals, namely MegaFon, MTS and Vimpelcom.
The said plan was confirmed by Kommersant last Wednesday. The Russian daily quoted an anonymous source as saying, "We want to create another player in addition to the big three. But we can go for a compromise." The source was a government official, referring to the three telecommunications firms as MegaFon, MTS and Vimpelcom, which have dominated the Russian telecoms market.
A MTS spokesman said that Russian telecoms firm would 'examine any specific proposals.' For its part, MegaFon, Vimpelcom and Rostelecom declined to provide any comment on the news report.
The plan falls within the earlier pronouncement by the Russian government of raising US$50 billion in the next five years by selling its interest in private enterprises. The plan was made in 2010 and since then, oil firm Rosneft as well as the country's two largest banks, namely Sberbank and VTB have been divested from the government's asset listings. There have been major drawbacks in the privatization of other state owned assets in private corporations, mainly criticism from the Ministry of Defence as to the sale of assets to foreigners being national security issues.
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