The new Minister of Transport and Infrastructure, Ciprian Serban said on Tuesday at the swearing-in ceremony, that the Ministry of Transport has been the flagship of the Romanian Government, and expressed his wish that it remain so, with the objective to have a milestone of 1,500 kilometers of motorways and expressways reached by the end of the year.

„Today, I am taking over a high-performing ministry, which I believe is the best performing ministry in the Romanian Government. Today, we have, as a matter of fact, a double handover. Sorin [Grindeanu, former Minister of Transport – editor’s note] will be elected President of the Chamber of Deputies today at the 12:00 meeting. The Ministry of Transport has been, in my view, the flagship, so to speak, of the Romanian government, and I want it to remain so,” Ciprian Serban said.

He specified that he has three major objectives as minister of Transport. Firstly, to reach the milestone of 1,500 km of motorways and expressways by the end of the year, to maximize the attraction of European funds and to reduce expenditure in companies under the MTI’s authority.

„I come with three major objectives to the Ministry of Transport, the main one being continuity, as Sorin [Grindeanu] said. Today we have 1,300 kilometers of high-speed roads, motorways, and expressways. We want to reach the 1,500 km mark by the end of the year. The second major objective is to continue attracting European funds, maximizing, if we may say so, the attraction of European funds. Then we can talk about optimization and cost reduction in companies. Today, I had a first meeting with the directors of the companies, with all of them. In the coming period, I will have specific discussions with each of them. I have asked and we will discuss each company for restructuring, where possible, for mergers, in a word, for streamlining expenses, as we have proven that it can be done in the Chamber of Deputies. As you well know, we have completed a stage there. We succeeded and achieved efficiency. We have saved a total of RON 25 million per year there. I want to reconfirm the same idea at the Ministry of Transport,” said Ciprian Serban.

AGERPRES