a member of the Council for Economic Coordination, Strategy and Reform. He was later Secretary of State in the Finance Ministry. At the time, Coșea was among the initiators of mass privatization strategies, and organized the latter as a release of coupons to citizens, to be transformed into stocks (see History of Romania since 1989). Although the measure was initially received with interest, the program was ultimately unsuccessful and most businesses up for privatization did not attract investors' attention (by late 2006, a third of them had gone bankrupt or were about to do so). Coșea attributed this negative phenomenon to the underdevelopment of the local capital market, as well as to strategy errors of both the PDSR majority (who had refused to give backing by privatizing Bancorex and Banca Agricolă) and the new Democratic Convention cabinet of Victor Ciorbea (who changed the privatization law to accommodate an initial public offering, viewed by Coșea as more susceptible to political corruption). He also indicated that only 60% of the companies listed for privatization had any real chance of success. In 1996-2000, Coșea represented the Parliament of Romania to the Central European Initiative. He currently sits on the Board of the National Commission for Economic Prognosis, Planning and Conjuncture. Following an investigation by the CNSAS into Securitate archives (August–October 2005), it was confirmed that Coșea had served as a secret police officer in service of the Communist authorities; the CNSAS was not, however, able to indicate whether he had actually been responsible for political repression. He rejected the verdict entirely, stressing that it contradicted the fact that he had worked abroad during much of the period. According to his version, the Securitate's Espionage Department (Direcția de Informații Externe, DIE) had repeatedly tried to recruit him during his stay in Switzerland. Additionally, he indicated that, in 1980, the DIE had kidnapped him and kept him secluded for almost a month, with the intention of obtaining his collaboration, that his daughter was threatened with physical harm, and that, eventually, he was released in exchange for pledging to renounce his office in Geneva (and giving the impression that this was his own decision). Coșea also stated that he was forced to wear an orthopedic cast over his leg, to give the impression that his disappearance was due to an automobile accident. In November 2006, it was rumored that Mircea Coșea weighed the possibility of leaving