“Dowry” for the Greek shipyards are the corvettes of the Navy

As the consolidation process of the Shipyards of Elefsina and Skaramangas, the second part of the Navy’s shipbuilding program is expected to endow the two industrial complexes with work. The Navy is proceeding immediately to activate the program to acquire three corvettes with the option of supplying one more. The Navy has come up with a list of three proposals, namely the FCx30 (Doha) corvettes of the Italian Fincantieri, the Gowind 2500 of the French Naval Group, and the Sigma 10514 of the Dutch Damen.

The imminent decommissioning of the two shipbuilding units, according to with the Minister of National Defense Nikos Panagiotopoulos, “has a great positive impact on the domestic defense industry as well, given that we are on the final stretch to decide on warship building programs of critical national importance.” Speaking on Thursday during the signing of the agreement to clean up the Elefsina Shipyards, the minister emphasized that “it is a necessary condition – we, the government, put it as a necessary condition – that some of them (including corvettes) are also built in Greek or Greek shipyards, as well as to support the other ships of the fleet (including the upgrade of the MEKO frigates)”.

The program

As revealed at the beginning of the week, the Navy is immediately proceeding with the activation of the program for the acquisition of three corvettes with the option of supplying one more (3+1). The Navy has come up with a list of three proposals, namely the corvettes FCx30 (Doha) of the Italian Fincantieri, the Gowind 2500 of the French Naval Group, and the Sigma 10514 of the Dutch Damen, with the proposals of Italy and France estimated to gather the most probabilities.

It is therefore characteristic that for several months now Fincantieri has made extensive contacts with the new management of the Elefsina Shipyards, as it seeks to take over the program and thus seeks to serve, as far as possible, the government’s demand that work be given to Greek shipyards as well.

At the same time, the competitor Naval Group, which has already undertaken the shipbuilding program of the three frigates and has subcontracted smaller and larger projects to approximately 20 Greek companies, in response to a related question from “K” states that “it is looking forward to expanding its structure in Greece to support the rapid development of these activities, and this principle will be extended and further developed as part of Naval Group’s proposal to the Hellenic Navy for the Gowind corvettes, for which Naval Group is working in particular with the Skaramangas Shipyard as well as with the rest of the Greek DITB (including Greek defense industrial and technological base). This will ensure the full satisfaction of Greek expectations regarding Greek content for this program.”

The agreement

The consolidation agreement of the Elefsina Shipyards was signed on Thursday by the investor ONEX Shipyards, the Minister of Development Adonis Georgiadis as the representative of the creditors of the State, but also the other creditors, including the employees. The agreement will be submitted immediately for ratification by the competent court and the decision is expected to be issued at the beginning of the year. According to the Minister of Development, a delegation from the American state development bank DFC, which will finance the Elefsina Shipyards with working capital of up to 105 million, is coming to Greece next week. According to the head of ONEX Panos Xenokostas, the unit is expected to operate under the new regime until the beginning of spring, while from the summer it will be ready to take on defense work, if it arises.

Payment of 123 million euros

In the meantime, an amendment is expected immediately that will allow the Greek State to pay to the special management of the Skaramangas Shipyards an amount of 123 million (which the State owes as a result of an arbitration decision and not to offset this amount with the state subsidies that must recover), so that debts and compensations to the workers are paid. Collecting this amount from the special administration will allow it to close the matter with the workers before transferring the shipyard facilities (this is half of the total area of ​​the yards controlled by the special administration) free of liabilities to the highest bidder, the group of Giorgos Prokopiou. This is the bidder-investor who prevailed in the tenders of the Public Real Estate Company (ETAD) and the special management of the Skaramangas Shipyards in July 2021 with a price of 37.3 million euros in the first and another 25.2 million in the second for the other half of the yard.

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