Betting on coal. (Market Place Privatization).

WITH THE COUNTRY'S guerrilla war showing no end in sight and Colombia's economy just hinting at the possible start of recovery, it would seem like the wrong time to move forward with a major privatization. Nonetheless, beleaguered Colombia is pushing a plan to sell its stake in the world's largest open-pit coal mine.

The minimum bid for Carbocol, the country's remaining 50 percent stake in the El Cerrejon Zona Norte mine, is US$435 million--a pittance compared with the US$1.5 billion the government sold the other half to ExxonMobil for in 1984. "The bloom is off the rose," says independent mining consultant Gerald Spindler, the former CEO of Cyprus-Amax, the US' …