ANKARA - Finance Minister Kemal Unakitan will invite Arab investors to bid for enterprises to be privatized and purchase debenture bonds which can be converted to shares during his tour of Persian Gulf countries.
Together with Treasury Undersecretary Ibrahim. H. Canakci, Privatization Administration Board Deputy Chairman Metin Kilci and several bureaucrats, Unakitan will start his tour of Gulf countries on Monday.
Following official meetings in their first stop Bahrain, meetings will be held to introduce state economic enterprises (SEEs) and debenture bonds which can be converted to shares.
Unakitan and accompanying delegation will proceed to Kuwait on Wednesday and later to Dubai on Thursday, and similar meetings will be held there.
The delegation headed by Unakitan will return to Turkey on Friday.
During meetings, Canakci will give information about alternative investment opportunities in Turkey, particularly those debenture bonds to Arab investors, and he will explain the measures that Turkey took and will take to encourage foreign capital.
Meanwhile, Kilci will inform Arab institutional investors and bankers on the SEEs to be privatized.
Finance Ministry bureaucrats will give information to Arab investors about the bill which is currently on the parliamentary agenda and allows foreigners to purchase real estate in Turkey.
Officials said that there was nearly one trillion U.S. dollars capital in the United States and Europe, and there was potential of fifty billion U.S. dollars of investment in Turkey by Arab investors if Turkey managed to draw five percent of Arab capital in the United States and Europe after several restrictions had been imposed on Arabs following the September 11 incidents.
(MS-AÖ) 13.06.2003