Patriciu: Romania lacks purpose, direction and leadership

Dinu Patriciu, former Rompetrol owner, who, after selling the
group, became the richest man in Romania, believes the Romanian
economy could return to positive territory in 2010, but only under
certain circumstances. According to the businessman, who was voted
by ZF’s readers as Romania’s biggest capitalist of the last 20
years, the capital mistake of this period has been the separation
between the business world and the political world. This led to
there being no transfer of competence and to the development of an
internal crisis in the last 20 years, with the international crisis
adding to it. Patriciu says the time after the elections becomes
crucial for implementing measures to help develop the business
world, as well as to cut budget expenses, otherwise Romania risks
to remain a country of peripheral importance. “Being at the
periphery is a state of mind, it is not about geographical
location. What we lack is purpose, direction, leadership, and all
these come when a normality of relations is established,” Patriciu
says. Patriciu says this state of normality and the creation of
competitive advantages for investors could help Romania out of the
crisis, and send the economy on an upward trend. He also says
privatisations can no longer be put off.