AMMAN, 4 July 2006 — Fifteen deputies have signed a petition calling for the suspension of the sale of Jordan’s Umniah Mobile Communications (UMC) to Bahrain Telecommunications Company (Batelco).
The lawmakers contended that the deal should be halted until the state restored its rights as represented in the “huge difference” between the fees of the operating license granted to Umniah and the value of the deal.
Last week, Batelco agreed to purchase a 96 per cent state in Umniah for $415 million .
The MPs said the government was “conned”, because it sold the operating licence to Umnia for only six million dollars in addition to granting the company tax exemptions and several concessions in order to help it stand on its feet. “How come there is such a big difference between the license fee and the price of the company?”, said deputy Mamdouh Abbadi, one of the signatories of the petition.
