There is too much emphasis on privatisation and too little on governance, said SD president Igor Lukšič, who lamented the lack of a clear management strategy centred around "the strategic interest of how to be masters of our own domain".

The prevailing opinion in the party is that selling assets cannot be the primary goal, the focus needs to be on governance and the search for strategic partners, he said.

France Križanič, former finance minister from the SD ranks, opined that the incorporation of the SSH was "an attempt to solve the problem by selling off Slovenia".

"Selling anything in these circumstances - the pressure will be to bring the price down as much as possible - is disastrous folly."

Rado Bohinc, former SD interior minister and former chancellor of the University of Primorsko, proposed that the idea of a single manager of state assets should be scrapped.

Instead, management of assets should be "professionalised" within the framework of an independent state body, he said.

Similarly, Ljubljana Faculty of Economics professor Maks Tajnikar, who has close ties to the SD, said there was no need for an independent authority for the management of state capital assets.

"I cannot imagine a minister not having clout" over key companies from his portfolio, he said, noting that removing politics from management would only create an opening for interest groups.

The debate also featured the heads of the state-run SOD and KAD funds, Tomaž Kuntarič and Bahtijar Djalil, who shared the opinion that centralising management in SSH was not necessarily the best option.

It may well happen that assets which we may want to keep in state ownership will be sold, said Kuntarič.