Dec. 22 (Bloomberg) -- American International Group Inc., the insurer that received a U.S. bailout, plans to repay the government next year, and the firm’s $450 million employee- retention program is needed to carry out the effort, Chief Executive Officer Edward Liddy told CNBC.

The insurer “would like to” pay back the $60 billion loan in 2009, Liddy told the financial network in an on-air interview today. The New York-based company received a government rescue, including the purchase of preferred shares, worth a total of about $150 billion to prevent losses at banks that did business with the insurer.

Liddy is selling businesses including life insurance, retirement services and a plane-leasing unit to repay the U.S. loan. He has had to respond to critics of AIG’s plan to give more than 2,000 employees cash awards to dissuade them from quitting, saying that the payments are necessary and already disclosed in regulatory filings.

“Anybody who wants to start an insurance company or beef up their position, they will come to our organization and pick people off,” Liddy said in the interview. “If that happens, we can’t maintain the businesses we want to keep and we won’t be able to sell them for the kinds of values that we need.”

Representative Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat, has requested that Liddy testify in a congressional hearing about the “full extent” of the company’s program to keep workers. The insurer may give retention pay to as many as 7,000 employees, a person familiar with the matter has said. Cummings, a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, has said AIG misled him about the scope of the plan.

Unit Sales

AIG said today it was selling its Hartford Steam Boiler unit to Munich Re, the world’s largest reinsurer, for $742 million. AIG has already agreed to sell AIG Private Bank, a unit catering to wealthy clients in Asia and the Middle East, to Abu Dhabi-based Aabar Investments PJSC for 307 million Swiss francs ($279 million). It is also selling a stake in an insurance joint venture in Brazil for $820 million.

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