PT Timah expects to sell more shares this year

Publicly listed tin mining company PT Timah is expected, this year, to carry out the second stage of its privatization program which has been delayed for several times, Bisnis Indonesia reported on Friday.

"We hope the second stage of the privatization could be carried out this year," the company's president Thobrani Alwi was quoted as saying. He, however, said that if the privatization could not be carried out this year, the management would ask for a delay in the payment of the company's tax.

PT Timah, which carried the first stage of its privatization in early 1990s by selling 14 percent of the government?s shares to the public through the capital market, was scheduled to launch the second stage of the privatization at the end of 1999. However, due certain reasons, the company has thus far still the second stage of the privatization.

Thobrani said that the company would also ask for a delay in the payment of tax resulting from the company's restructuring program in late 1990s if the privatization could not be carried out as scheduled.

He said that PT Timah was allowed to transfer its assets based on book value as part of the restructuring program. But the transferred asset would be revaluated under a market price if the second stage of the privatization were further delayed. (*)