Bechtel to lay off more than 800 workers from the Transylvania Highway site

Newsroom 22/11/2010 | 11:13

American Bechtel, the company building Romania’s Transylvania Highway, announced on Friday that it plans to make redundant over 800 employees working on the highway site.

The reasons given by the constructor are the fact that the construction area is not ready for further works and that Romanian authorities have not paid the debts for works finished in 2010.

Union leader Mihai Lup , cited by Mediafax, said on Friday that Bechtel plans to carry out its “massive layoff plan” between January 20, 2011 and February 28, 2011. According to Lup, 834 employees working on the highway are to be sacked.

Bechtel’s announcement comes after last week, Prime Minister Emil Boc and Transport Minister Anca Boagiu cut the ribbon to open a new ten-kilometer section of the Transylvania Highway between Turda and Campia Turzii in northwestern Romania. A first 42-kilometer section of the Transylvania Highway, which is designed to be 415-kilometers long, was completed and opened to traffic in December last year.

Simona Bazavan