Deutsche Telekom group is forced to postpone for nearly one year the completion of Ro-Net project, which means the broadband Internet connecting of the 783 disadvantaged localities in Romania, hotnews.ro informs. Ro-Net, amounting to EUR 80 million, should have been completed by the end of this year. If the project is phased on the fiscal year 2014-2020, Romania will lose EU funds unused from 2007-2013 period, according to analyzed data. This although Sorin Grindeanu, former Minister for the Information Society in Victor Ponta’s Government, assured that this will not happen and the authorities are in talks with the European Commission for phasing the project for 2014 – 2020 period. The officials from the Ministry for the Information Society (MSI) estimate that by year-end it will be spent over RON 88.6 million, which is only about 24 percent out of the total value of the project in 2007-2013. This means that Romania will lose the remaining of over 60 million this financial year. If Telekom officials say the Ro-Net project has been phased for 2016 and the part that will be implemented in the next year will be financed from the 2014-2020 budget year,” ministry officials are optimistic that the phasing will be obtained. They point out that currently, the procedures required to obtain the agreement of the European Commission are underway. According to Telekom, the final acceptance and commissioning of the entire project is scheduled for the second half of 2016. “Now, the building sites in over 150 cities are open and the works in 102 towns will be completed by the end of this year,” the Minister for the Information Society, Marius Bostan, estimates. In August, Nikolai Beckers, CEO of Telekom Romania, criticised local authorities for slowing its infrastructure work for the Ro-Net project in the last year. Ro-Net project is unlikely to be ready within the deadline agreed with Brussels and in these circumstances the government will receive no refunds, warned Beckers. Ro-Net broadband project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund. The total value of the project is RON 377.838 million, of which the financial assistance irredeemable grant is RON 252.282 million. The contract for building the Ro-Net network was attributed to Telekom Romania (formerly Romtelecom and Cosmote Romania). The project’s objective is to build and operate a national infrastructure for broadband communications for the provision of electronic communications services in disadvantaged rural areas who currently are not covered by broadband internet services. With this project, Romania wishes to promote economic growth and the creation jobs in areas covered by the programme.
Update: Bucharest Mayor Nicusor Dan won the Romanian presidential election on May 18, according to the official vote count. With 98.5% of the ballots counted, Nicusor Dan had 54.17% of the votes, 900,000 more than his opponent, nationalist George Simion. A record turnout both in the country and abroad helped Dan come back from 1.88 million […]
Romanians showed up in record numbers to vote in the second round of the presidential elections, both in the country and abroad. The exit poll results presented on Sunday evening pointed to a strong lead for Bucharest’s pro-EU mayor Nicusor Dan (54%-46%), but are only relevant for the domestic vote. Both candidates claimed victory in […]
Romanians showed up in large numbers to vote in the second round of the country’s presidential elections, one of the most important democratic tests Romania has seen in the last three decades. At 14:00, exactly halfway through the voting process in the country, over 5.63 million Romanians have cast their votes, compared with 4.52 million […]
Romanians abroad have mobilized massively to vote in the second round of the country’s presidential elections. Update: By Sunday afternoon (15:00 Bucharest time), over 1.2 million Romanians have voted abroad for the country's next president. That's some 220,000 more votes than the overall total in the first round. The countries with the largest turnout are […]
Romanians abroad have mobilized massively to vote in the second round of the country’s presidential elections. The vote in Diaspora started on Friday morning, and by Saturday evening (at 19:00), over 609,000 Romanians had already cast their votes. The turnout is almost 90% higher than the one recorded at the same time in the first […]
It's almost impossible to think about anything not related to elections this weekend but if you should need some distraction, there are options. Happening now is the European Film Festival, screening recent productions from the continent, very varied in theme, tone, and genre. The fest is playing Bucharest, Sfântu Gheorghe and Timișoara until Sunday and […]
