The chairman of troubled shipbuilding group Vinashin, Nguyen Ngoc Su, spoke to Tin Tuc (News) newspaper about rumours that Credit Suisse had refused to extend repayment of its first $600 million of a total $4.2 billion debt.

Is it true that foreign banks have denied Vinashin's request to delay the first repayment on December 20?

Vinashin issued $600 million worth of bonds through Credit Suisse in 2007. Under the contract, Vinashin has to pay the money in 10 lumps every six months.

The group should have made the first repayment of $60 million on Monday, but it is in a difficult position and doesn't have enough money to clear the debt at once. For this reason, Vinashin has already requested foreign banks to postpone the debt for one year. Then, the group will surely be able to pay it.

So far, Vinashin has not received any documents from foreign banks saying they do not agree with the group's request. In principle, these banks will decide to accept Vinashin's request or not based on the outcome of voting. Credit Suisse said it had not yet received votes from all creditors. We are still waiting final answers.

How will Vinashin clear this first debt repayment?

It is impossible to restructure the group in a fortnight. Vinashin needs time to implement the restructure and complete its projects before it will be able to pay its debts. At the moment, Vinashin is trying to negotiate with creditors for very flexible measures to deal with the debt.

Specifically, the group will have to re-organise 216 companies first before it can negotiate with its partners to transfer them. It has high expectations of earning about VND23 trillion ($1.15 billion) from selling these companies.

Besides this, the group will speed up its trading and production activities while completing vessels so that they can be handed over to ship owners.

Vinashin will also equitise some limited-liability companies and advertise them for sale. Not least, the group will use materials and equipment worth many thousand billion dong that is storing in its warehouses to build ships or sell them to retrieve the principal.

The group bought all this to build about 100 ships. But the global economic crisis put many ship owners in a difficult position and forced them to abrogate contracts they had signed with Vinashin. The result is that the goods have been left unused for three years.

Vinashin's restructuring aims at cutting debt and restoring and developing the group. How has the plan been implemented?

Along with speeding up trading and production, Vinashin is negotiating with ship owners to extend deadlines for completing ships. So far this year, the group has handed over 27 ships to ship owners. Another eight ships will be handed over this Saturday and six more by the end of the month.

At this rate, Vinashin will surpass its target. This year, the group is expected to hand over ships worth a total of $700 million.

The group also implemented a plan to re-organise its 216 companies as soon as the Prime Minister approved Vinashin's restructuring on December 7, this year. Some investors have registered to buy, while others are finding out more about these companies.

However, the group is much concerned about 13,000 labourers who will be made redundant after the 216 companies are re-organised and reduced to 43 units. For the time being, these workers will be given jobs depending on their ability and needs.

Skilled engineers and workers will be sent to work at key shipbuilding companies while the rest will be employed by joint stock companies that are sold to investors.

Vinashin will co-ordinate with enterprises, the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour, departments for labour, invalids and social affairs, cities and provinces to generate suitable jobs and compensate labourers of companies being closed down.

Source: VNS