Romanian national airline Tarom is the first of a planned series of state owned companies to have private sector management installed. Dumitru Prunariu, Dan Pascariu, Lucian Isar and Marius Ghenea were named as new members of Tarom's Administration Council. Dumitru Prunariu is a retired astronaut, Dan Pascariu is a banker, president of the council with UniCredit Tiriac Bank, Lucian Isar is the former Minister for Business and Marius Ghenea is an entrepreneur.

The future CEO will be selected from the the Council of Administration during their first meeting, which could take place on Wednesday. The other three members of  Tarom's Council of Administration are Ciprian Ladunca, Valentin Macec and Heinrich Vystupil.

The Prime Minister Victor Ponta declared at the beginning of September that Tarom will probably be the first company to have a private manager, most likely a manager from abroad but with great experience in the field.

The Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure asked PwC, D & B David Baias-George Butunoiu to recruit senior management for companies under the authority of the Ministry with a turnover of less than EUR 7.3 million.

CFR SA (CFR Infrastructure), CFR, Tarom, CNADNR, Metrorex, Bucharest Airports, Maritime Ports Administration Constanta Maritime Ports Administration, Timisoara International Airport "Traian Vuia" and Telecommunications CFR are also included in the plan.

The consultants interviewed over 1,000 people for the 54 positions of managers and of the short list of 319 candidates.  The majority are Romanian citizens, from the private sector.

Ioana Toader, ioana.toader@romania-insider.com